by Olivia
And he had called her a whore.
Olivia recognised her rising fury for what it was, a weakness. A chink. A lacuna in her character. No, she was not yet indifferent to Jai Raventhorne. The testimony of the tremble in her hands, the smouldering embers of anger so ready to flare, the intensity of her reaction to the sight of that damned locket—all these were proof of her failure. Callously, Olivia tossed the locket into a corner of her almirah, vowing to discard it later. But the embers continued to smoulder; Jai Raventhorne had called her a whore. And he had not thought to ask her, not once, why she had married Freddie!
Ironically, that was the one question from Jai Raventhorne that Olivia still feared the most!
"Any further instructions for furniture and suchlike?" Willie Donaldson asked. "Ships' rations are bloody near inedible. I've made arrangements for plenty of dry stores and for two milking goats for the bairn."
Willie's grave concern for her, and his obvious grief at her abandonment of Calcutta, again touched Olivia. "No, Mr. Donaldson," she said gently, with affection, "you have done more than enough as it is."
Gruffly, he waved aside her gratitude. "Noo, aboot funds for the journey and after . . ."
"I have enough, thank you," she said and quickly steered him toward another matter. "About Hal Lubbock—have you been in touch with him again?"
He turned even more glum. "Aye. The danged dandiprat canna wait to move in," he muttered sourly. "Her Ladyship would faint at the very idea of that ill-mannered oaf loose aboot the manse." He brooded for a moment on that, then sighed. "That loan Your Ladyship has made to Ransome . . ."
"Yes? What about it?"
"Would there be more loans being planned?"
"If necessary. Why?"
As an indication of his disapproval he tapped the point of his pencil against his front tooth. "I would na advise it. Certainly na after what happened at the manse that night." To Donaldson the Birkhurst house was always the manse as if none other existed.
"Oh? I'm sorry, but I don't see the connection."
He bristled. "The connection is that Josh might be finished but the Templewood and Ransome name plate still remains. The bastard's na going to rest till he puts them right oot of business. He's going to hit oot in any direction, and I happen to believe we should na be giving him provocation by trying to salvage a sinking ship."
"We are not, Mr. Donaldson, I am. And you already know my views on that. In any case," she retrieved some papers off his desk and rose, "I will not be here when Mr. Raventhorne returns from Assam. Therefore his future designs, evil or otherwise, are immaterial to me."
She left Donaldson dissatisfied and still glowering at his feet, but by the time she had reached home, Olivia had forgotten the conversation. It was Amos's supper-time. As always, she liked to feed him his evening meal because he gobbled it up with such amusing relish. With a sprightliness that would have surely earned a sharp rebuke from Dr. Humphries, she ran up the stairs to the top floor and flung open the door of the nursery. But then she skidded to an abrupt halt.
Sitting cross-legged on the floor and feeding her son out of his little silver bowl as he sat on her lap was her cousin Estelle.
Estelle? Estelle . . .? For a moment Olivia thought she was hallucinating. Why, Estelle was well on her way to Cawnpore! Surely this was some horrible trick being played on her by a hyperactive imagination?
But then Estelle confirmed her flesh and blood manifestation and spoke. "Can you believe it? The little imp actually bit me! Who would think that one half of one tiny tooth could inflict such damage?" She laughed and wryly held up a finger.
It was the laugh that, like a splash of ice water, jolted Olivia back into reality. Weak with shock, she clung trembling to the door-post. "What are you doing here . . .?" she whispered, deathly white.
"I came to see you." Estelle showed no sign of embarrassment. "I was waiting downstairs when Amos started to cry. Naturally I had no idea that he was here, so I ran up to see him. Mary was about to give him his supper. I took charge of that and sent her and the ayah off for their meal." She looked mildly accusing. "I persuaded John to postpone our going so that I could see you." She chuckled the child under the chin and he gurgled.
"Get out." Olivia's eyes were stricken and, try as she might, she could not raise her voice above a whisper. The familiar fingers of fear played havoc with her spine—Estelle would know, Estelle already knew! With a single blow she had made a mockery of all her precautions, all her lies and her plottings and her manifold deceptions. She ran forward and wrenched her son off her cousin's lap. "Get out!" she screamed. "If you dare touch my son again I... I'll kill you!"
Slowly Estelle stood up, her face as chalky as her cousin's. "It's no use, Olivia," she said, starting to tremble. "It's too late— you see, I know that Jai is your son's father. Now give him back to me, can't you see he's still hungry?" As if to confirm her observation, Amos emitted a furious wail and started to struggle in Olivia's arms. Estelle calmly reached out to retrieve him, then sat him up in his crib and began to feed him again.
Numb with despair, Olivia had no strength to resist her. Slowly her rage dissolved into an overwhelming sense of defeat. She had lost. She had been a blind fool to even consider that she would not. There were too many variables against her, there always had been. Sick with hopelessness, she slunk to the nearest chair and slumped into it. "Why did you not go to Cawnpore?" she asked dully.
"Because John felt that I should meet you and apologise in person." Estelle's tone was flinty. "Whatever explanations I had wanted to make to you earlier, explanations you would not hear, I felt you had forfeited the right to have. I came here today only to please John. What I had not bargained for was . . .," she faltered and her tone changed, "Amos." Unbidden, a sob sounded in her throat and she could not suppress it. "I know now why you have hated me so much . . ."
Wearily Olivia dragged the back of her hand across her eyes, the fight flowing out of her. "I don't hate you, Estelle. I just want you to go and leave me alone. Please, Estelle, just. . . go!"
Engrossed in feeding the child, Estelle made no move to comply. "Jai does not know that he has a son, does he." It was a statement, not a question.
Olivia shuddered but could make no response. Too broken even for anger, she merely sat with her chin lowered against her chest.
"That is why you had to marry Freddie. I know now about Mama's attempt to kill herself; I forced Uncle Arthur to tell me everything." The last of Amos's supper gone, she wiped his mouth with a napkin and handed him a toy. "By leaving Mama you risked having her make another attempt, as she had threatened to. By staying, you risked a scandal even more horrendous, considering who Amos's father is." Her voice cracked and her china blue eyes suddenly welled. "Yes, you do have cause to hate me. Your hate is entirely justified, Olivia. Oh God, how justified!"
"Estelle, please . . ."
Embarked at last on her voyages of belated discovery, Estelle could not be stopped. "I was the ill-starred, ill-fated weapon Jai used to destroy your life, and I never even suspected it!"
"The time for penitence and recriminations has passed, Estelle!" Loathing the prospect of post mortems, Olivia harshly scythed through her remorse. "Explanations are now irrelevant. Can't you see it's too late for all that?"
"For you, maybe," Estelle cried, her tone equally resolute, "but not for me. Can't you see that now more than ever I must convince you that Jai has never been my lover?"
More tricks? Dear God, no more! Olivia prayed in silent despair.
"It's true, Olivia, I swear it." Her eyes dropped and she flushed scarlet. "I give you my word that Jai has never, never laid a hand on me. How could he have when . . .?" She choked and turned her face away.
"No?" Olivia's laugh held a vicious touch of humour. "My dear, dear Coz, you wrote me a letter, remember?" Did the brainless girl really expect her to believe her barefaced lies?
"Yes, I remember." With an effort Estelle retrieved her composure. "I don't deny that I w
as dazzled by Jai. The ... elopement was his idea, but I did agree to it with alacrity, with enthusiasm. That much is true. I genuinely believed that he returned my . . . feelings, although he never said so, not once, with words. Oh, he spun me plenty of fairytales, insinuated many promises, blinded me with glorious visions of London and New York and the wide, wide world outside that I longed to see." She stopped to glare defiantly. "You must know better than anyone else, after all, how plausible that silver-tongued charm of his can be!"
Anger stirred but Olivia refused to dignify it with a reaction.
"I was bewitched by Jai." Calm again, Estelle continued. "Like a mindless puppet, I followed him onto his Ganga, filled with inane dreams of eternal rapture. But once the Ganga sailed, everything changed. Jai changed . . ." Her voice hushed; her expression stilled. "That first night, intoxicated with my silly dreams, I lay preening myself on the four-poster in my new georgette neglige waiting for—"
"Stop it!" Outraged, Olivia leapt to her feet, unable to tolerate more. "I don't want to hear any of this! A few days ago you called it an escapade, a trifling adventure to teach—"
"Whether you want to or not, my precious cousin, you will hear it! You will hear every damn word I am about to tell you." Estelle ran to the door, slammed it shut, turned the key in the lock and rammed it down the front of her bodice. "Sit down, Olivia. All these days you have denied me a hearing. Even if I have to tie you down in that chair, you will not deny me one now, you can't deny me one now!"
Faced with her cousin's blazing eyes, cheeks flaming with hot anger, Olivia felt her own will falter. "You can't force me to listen . . .," she began weakly. Regardless of the protest, Estelle forged on.
"When Jai finally came into the master cabin, he had turned into someone I barely recognised. He looked demented, so ravaged by restless energy that he could scarcely stay still. He tore down a curtain from a porthole and flung it at me, commanding me to cover myself unless I wanted to have my backside tanned with a hairbrush." Even to that, Olivia made no sarcastic comment. If nothing else, it might be interesting to see just how far Estelle was prepared to go with her ludicrous fabrications. "Then he sat down and informed me that, as a woman, I offended the man in him. In fact," Estelle quivered, "he said he despised me because I was a selfish, cosseted, English brat who sickened him with her blatant immodesty. His intentions towards me were simple: He would take me to England and dump me with either my mother or with John Sturges. He looked at me very strangely, cruelly, and added, 'whichever of the two is prepared to accept you.' " Estelle paled at the memory, her face almost translucent in its loss of colour. "I didn't understand what he meant. At least not then . . ."
"Oh, is that so?" Wildly sceptical, Olivia finally sought refuge in sarcasm. "Hence all this sudden affection? These glowing character certificates? To say nothing of that impertinent invitation to my house!"
Estelle laughed, a pathetic little sound full of sadness. "Oh, Olivia, Olivia—my poor, dear, ill-used cousin! I never thought I would see the day when you, so infinitely superior to me, would turn jealous. No, please don't flare up again, I haven't quite finished." Amos whimpered. Ignoring Olivia's angry expletive, she walked to the crib and handed him his silver rattle. Then she went to stand by the window with her back to the room. "I was livid with him, of course, shocked by his callousness and mortally offended. I tried to argue, to fight, to demand explanations, but he would neither listen nor answer any questions. Instead, he locked me up in the cabin, vowing to keep me there until we docked at Southampton." She turned, empty faced, to look at Olivia. "All those days that I remained locked up, I fumed and fretted and cried, not understanding anything about his sadistic motivations, unable to see why he had humiliated me with such callousness. Then, when we reached Cape Town, he suddenly relented and removed the lock from the cabin door." She stopped to refresh her throat with a drink of cold water from the carafe that stood on a table. Then, running the tip of her finger around the rim of the glass, she stood lost in thought for a moment. "It was in Cape Town," she said eventually, her tone deathly hushed, "that Jai told me the truth. Everything. I now know that he held back nothing. I asked Uncle Arthur to corroborate it. He did." Her hands were shaking so much that the glass almost fell, so she replaced it on the table.
So, Estelle also knew! Then why had the unthinking, foolish girl risked that confrontation between Raventhorne and her father at the ball? Pulling in a crisp breath, Olivia chose not to make any comment just yet. There was more to come and Estelle would not now be thwarted.
"Why Jai decided to suddenly inflict the truth upon me, I had no idea—except to ensure that it would double my suffering, perhaps. I was appalled, Olivia, decimated—I couldn't believe it!" Softly, she started to weep. "Later, I began to recall things— snatches from the past, fragments of overheard conversations, furtive whispers between Mama and Papa, terrible rows behind closed doors. And I remembered something else: that portrait of Grandmama in our dining-room. Then, everything started to fall into place. I was astonished that I had not made the deduction before. Grandmama's eyes had stared down at me all my life, Olivia." Her own eyes rounded with renewed horror. "Amos's eyes. Jai's eyes . . ."
Estelle's voice trickled away. Between them, covering the room like a dense fog, a silence fell. It was thick and it was chilly. In the lull Amos dropped his rattle and they both started. Mechanically Olivia rose, picked up the rattle and handed it back to the child.
"Yes," Olivia said calmly, cracking the silence first, "I know the truth. I know that Uncle Josh is Jai Raventhorne's father."
It was out. For the first time the secret behind the enigma had been spoken aloud. Even though she had known the truth for some time and now it was she who had voiced it, Olivia felt a frisson of shock run through her and she shivered.
With a cry, Estelle covered her face with her hands. "You are clever and perceptive and far too astute not to have guessed, Olivia, but to me Jai's revelation came with the force of a thunderbolt. I could not believe that such a hideous thing could be true!"
As Estelle surrendered herself to emotions raked into rawness, and huge, rasping sobs rocked her shoulders, Olivia was suddenly beset with confusion. Watching Estelle, she felt the first stirrings of uncertainty. Could it be that her cousin's absurdly improbable farrago was true . . .?
Estelle wiped her eyes and noisily blew her nose. It looked as red as a boiled lobster. Fighting for control, she swallowed hard. The effort to continue did not come easily. "I saw then why Jai had persuaded me to run away with him," she said wretchedly. "Jai had vowed to destroy us all. He knew nothing could be more thorough a weapon than the stench of . . . of . . ." Stuck in her throat, the word took time to dislodge, "of. . . incest. It was he who suggested that I write that letter to Papa and Mama, that letter that would not leave any doubts in their minds as to his intentions. They had never told me the truth. They knew I could not have possibly suspected that Jai was my half brother, that we shared a father. Jai didn't care a damn about a public scandal. If it came, well and good; if it didn't, it wouldn't matter. As long as my parents believed me to be defiled, contaminated, forever a pariah, it was enough for his purposes. They would never recover from the shock; they would always remain trapped in the secret hell of that knowledge they could not share with anyone. However much I protested my innocence, no one would believe me." For the first time Estelle sounded bitter and, in her bitterness, angry. "And no one does. No one except my darling, sweet, trusting John. And, perhaps, Uncle Arthur." She gave a despairing little laugh. "You don't believe me either, do you, Olivia? Isn't that why you have found me . . . repugnant?"
It was an accusation Olivia was not yet prepared to deny. Boiling with doubts, her mind bubbled like a cauldron about to overflow. There was in Estelle's voice something she could no longer dismiss: the unmistakable ring of truth. But a hundred mushrooming questions still remained unanswered. Loose ends dangled, puzzles still cried out to be solved, paradoxes abounded. And, in the ultimate ana
lyses, no matter how startling her cousin's confessions, nothing she had said reduced the enormity of her own betrayal by Jai Raventhorne.
Estelle misinterpreted her silence and stiffened. "I know you still don't believe me, but it doesn't matter. Had I not learned about Amos, I would not have wasted so much of your time. It is because of him that I felt you earned the right to know the truth." Softening, she walked to the crib where the child had finally dropped off to sleep, gently smoothed his hair and draped a sheet over his exposed legs. "You must have loved very deeply to have risked so much, Olivia." Her voice was husky.
Olivia stared at her glacially. "One way or another, it no longer is relevant. I am the wife of another man. I might not love him, but I cannot forget his goodness to me." The cold eyes turned empty. "My son's name is Birkhurst—make no mistake about that ever, Estelle! My once-upon-a-time motives are forgotten. After I have gone away, they will cease to have even existed." She held out a hand. "Now, may I please have back that key?"
Estelle searched her expression. Finding no encouragement in it, she shrugged. "By all means." She dug into her bodice and tossed the key to Olivia. "Two more explanations whether you like them or not. Yes, it was insane of me to ask Papa to come that night, but it was a justifiable delusion. When I returned, I told Papa the absolute truth, as I have told it to you now. He pretended to believe me. Or, because I so desperately wanted his love and trust again, I convinced myself that he did believe me. But Papa lied to me. In my naive faith, in my innocence, I did not see his lie. Not for a moment did he deviate from his intent to kill Jai. Laughably, I thought the public gesture of a simple handshake would suffice as a first step to a reconciliation even after a lifetime of such profound hatred." Her bitterness erupted again, making her distort her mouth as if the taste offended it. "As for Jai, he—"
