She certainly had blue eyes, which were characteristic of the Langs and Canèda had often thought in the past that she would like to have a large number of children who combined her mother’s dark hair and her father’s blue eyes, which were so sensational in her own face.
She thought now it would be unlikely that she would ever have any children and if she did they would not be born of love such as her father and mother had had for each other.
‘What is the use of thinking such stupid things?’ she asked herself angrily.
She walked across the room to look out into the garden and forced herself to think how beautiful it was with the lilacs coming into bloom and the syringa scenting the air.
Because it was so beautiful, while at the same time she knew despairingly that it did not move her as it would have done a few weeks ago, she felt the tears prick her eyes and told herself it was because she was tired.
‘It was a long journey, the sea was rough and I have not slept very well,’ she excused herself.
She heard the door open and forced a smile to her lips.
“I am back safe and sound, as you see, Harry,” she began and turned round to feel the words swept from her lips.
It was not Harry who had come into the sitting room but the Duc.
He was looking so familiar in his breeches, boots and grey whipcord riding coat, just as she had seen him after she had jumped into the riding school that for a moment she thought that he must be a ghost and she was imagining him.
Then, as he walked towards her, she watched him wide-eyed and said quickly,
“W-why are you – here?”
“I came to see your brother.”
Canèda felt as if she had stopped breathing.
Then, because she was frightened, she asked frantically,
“Why? What had you to – say to him? You – did not – tell him – ?”
Her voice died away because the Duc had reached her side and now she was palpitatingly aware of him and acutely conscious that he was close to her.
“I certainly told your brother that we had met,” the Duc said quietly.
“Why should you – want to do – that?”
“I have my own reasons for doing so.”
“Harry will be very – angry with – me if you told him – ”
There was no mistaking the agitation in her voice.
It swept through Canèda almost like a streak of lightning how furious Harry would be if the Duc had told him how she had pretended to belong to a circus!
Worse still if he had told him that she had dined alone with him and promised to stay the night!
As if the Duc was following her thoughts, he said quietly,
“I have not told your brother any of the things that are making you afraid.”
Canèda’s relief almost made her feel weak.
Then she asked,
“Why did you come to – see Harry – and why are you in – England?”
“The answer to both questions is the same.”
As if she suddenly remembered how much he had hurt her at the Château de Bantôme, she turned her face away from him to look out into the garden.
“I cannot understand – why you should come here,” she said in a voice that she tried to make cold and distant, “when you were so – rude to me when we last – met.”
“I was punishing you,” the Duc said, “as you tried to punish me.”
Canèda was surprised, but she did not speak and he went on,
“‘An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth! Was that not the reason why you came to Saumac?”
“How did you – find out – where I was?”
She was not looking at him, but she knew that he smiled.
“It was not very difficult. The innkeeper where you stayed was very impressed not only with the two very elegant ladies who stayed in his hostelry but with their magnificent horses.”
“He told – you that we had gone – back to Angers?”
“At Angers they told me you had gone to Nantes and from Nantes to St. Nazaire.”
“Then you – knew who – I was?”
“Of course!” the Duc replied. “Very large yachts belonging to English Noblemen are not so frequent in St. Nazaire that the inhabitants are not curious about them. In fact it was the Harbourmaster who informed me that you had left for Bordeaux.”
“Then you guessed – where I was going. ”
“The way your mother treated my father was, of course, something I have never been able to forget.”
“And did you – hate Mama as your – father did?”
“I never hated her,” the Duc said sharply. “I was merely aware that when he lost her, he lost the one thing that mattered to him in his life.”
There was silence and then as Canèda did not speak he said very quietly,
“The same thing happened when you went away and I found that you had gone!”
Canèda felt a little tremor run through her.
Then, as he said no more, she asked in a very small voice,
“Were you – very – angry?”
“I was not angry but distraught,” the Duc replied. “I thought I would never be able to find you again.”
“And when you did – you were cruel and unkind.”
“I am glad you felt like that.”
“Why? Because you were having your – revenge on – me?”
“No,” he answered, “because if I could hurt you, it meant that you cared.”
Canèda felt that it would be humiliating for him to know how much she cared and how unhappy she had been.
With an effort she managed to say,
“That still does not – explain why you are – here.”
“I am prepared to do so,” the Duc said, “but first I want to ask you a question.”
“What – is it?”
“I want you to look at me, Canèda, while I ask it.”
It flashed through Canèda’s mind that that was what he had asked her to do once before and because she was afraid of what she would see in his eyes, and more afraid of the strange feeling that was sweeping over her, she shook her head.
How could she explain to him that now he was here, now that he was talking to her, it was as if she was coming back to life?
She could feel him close beside her, feel the strange vibrations that she had always been conscious of emanating from him and she wanted, she thought crazily, to turn round and to touch him, to make sure that he was real.
“I told you to look at me, Canèda,” the Duc insisted.
He had been speaking in English ever since he had come into the room, and it seemed to Canèda that he was giving her an order almost in the same way that she ordered Ariel to obey her.
Then she was afraid, not of him but of her own feelings, afraid that if she looked into his grey eyes she would forget everything else and he would see how much she loved him.
Frantically she tried to say to herself, ‘he is married – he is married,’ but somehow the words meant nothing.
All she could think was that he was here, that she vibrated to his voice and whatever he asked of her it would be impossible to refuse.
“Look at me, Canèda.”
Now the words were not a command but a plea, so entreating that it was utterly impossible to do anything but obey.
Slowly, because she was trembling, Canèda turned round.
She faced him, but she did not raise her eyes. Instead they were on his well-tied, starched white stock.
The Duc did not speak, he did not move, he only waited until, as if it was impossible to resist him any longer, Canèda raised her eyes to his.
Then, as she had expected, as they looked at each other she thought that everything else was meaningless except the knowledge that he was here and that she belonged to him.
The Duc looked at her for what seemed a very long moment.
Then he said slowly, as if he was choosing his words with care,
“Answer me truthfu
lly, Canèda, what did you feel when I kissed you in the Château? I thought, but could not believe it to be true, that I was the first man ever to touch your lips.”
“The – only man,” Canèda whispered, and her voice was barely audible.
She saw a light come into the Duc’s eyes and he said,
“Your first kiss, le premier fois, and what did it mean to you?”
“I-I don’t think I can – tell you.”
“Tell me!”
Again it was a command and, because she felt shy, Canèda wished to take her eyes from his and yet it was impossible.
He held her captive and, although he was not even touching her, it was impossible to escape.
“Tell me!” he persisted.
“There are – no words to describe it – you carried me into the sky – and we were no longer – human but part of the moon – the stars, and the sun – and – and – God.”
Her voice trembled on the last word and now the Duc reached out his arms and pulled her against him roughly.
“And after that,” he asked, “did you think I could lose you? That is exactly how I felt, my darling, and you are mine!”
As he said the last words, his lips were on hers and at the touch of them Canèda felt as if the Heavens opened and lifted her out of the misery and depression she had felt ever since she had left Saumac and brought into the light that had seemed to envelop her once before when the Duc had kissed her.
His lips were demanding and fiercely insistent, as if he forced her to acknowledge his supremacy and his ownership of her.
At the same time she felt that he was wooing her and she surrendered herself to the wonder of his kiss as if he was the victor so that she could no longer fight against him.
Only when he raised his head did she say incoherently because the words were forced from her,
“I-I – love – you!”
“Say it again. Say it so that I need not be mistaken in knowing that you are really saying it.”
“I love you – I love – you!” Canèda cried and, because it was all so overwhelming, she hid her face against his neck.
He held her very close before he said,
“I have been so afraid, so desperately afraid that I was mistaken and yet how could what we both felt that night be anything but real?”
“It was – very real to – me,” Canèda murmured.
The Duc put his hand under her chin and turned her face up to his.
She thought that he would kiss her, but instead he looked down at her and she thought that there was a different expression on his face, softer and gentler than before.
She knew too that there was an expression of love in his eyes that she had always wanted to see.
“You are so beautiful!” he murmured. “So absurdly and ridiculously beautiful. How could you crucify me as you did by running away in that wicked way?”
“I-I was – frightened.”
“I am not surprised! How could you do anything so outrageous, so disgraceful, as to get yourself into such a position?”
Canèda felt the blood rising in her cheeks at his words and yet, when she would have hid her face again, he prevented her from doing so.
“I am very very angry with you,” he said, but there was no anger in the tone of his voice.
“You swear – you did not – tell Harry?” she asked.
“No. But I will make sure, as I know he would want me to, that you will never do anything like that again.”
“And you have – forgiven me?”
“If I made you as unhappy as I was myself,” the Duc said, “then I suppose we are what you would call ‘quits’.”
“I was very – very unhappy when you would not – look at me – or speak to – me.”
“I was afraid you might not care.”
Canèda knew that in fact she had felt despairingly that there was nothing left in life because she had lost him.
Then once again she remembered, almost as if it loomed over her like a great menacing cloud, that he was married.
“I am sure it is very wrong of – us to talk like – this.”
“Wrong?” he questioned.
She felt for the words to express the truth.
Then he said, as if again he had read her thoughts,
“Suppose now you ask me why I have come to see your brother.”
“I cannot – imagine why you – should do so,” Canèda said, “unless you wished to see his – horses.”
It struck her that that must be the explanation.
There was a smile on the Duc’s lips as he replied,
“I am certainly impressed by them, but I am deeply concerned with something far more important. His sister.”
“Y-you told Harry – that?” Canèda asked incredulously.
“Because I wish to behave conventionally in England at any rate, I told your brother that I hope to marry you.”
“To –to marry me?”
Canèda was so astonished that she moved away from his encircling arms to stand staring at him wide-eyed.
“B-but I was told – I understood – ”
“That I had a wife. That was true until three years ago.”
“She is dead?”
“But – no one knew – ”
“Why should they?” he asked. “I have never discussed my private affairs with anyone, not even my relatives. Ever since I was first married I have been embittered by what I suffered and I consider it my business and my business alone.”
He spoke sharply.
Then he said in a different tone of voice,
“I had decided never to marry again. I thought myself completely self-sufficient with my horses and Saumac until – I met you.”
“Is that – true?” Canèda asked.
“I think you know it is true without my saying any more,” the Duc said.
“I wanted you to love me,” Canèda said. “I do not wish you to feel now that because I am who I am, you are being pressured into marriage. After all – you asked me something – very different.”
“That was entirely your fault,” the Duc replied, “but I knew when I kissed you that I would never let you go and that to make sure you did not leave me I must make you my wife.”
“Did you – really feel – that?”
“I swear it,” the Duc answered. “But that still does not make me any less shocked at the risks you came in behaving as you did.”
Canèda smiled.
Because of what he had told her, because he had said that he loved her and had asked her to marry him, she felt as if there was music playing all round her and the air was sparkling with light.
“It may have been outrageous – and you may have been – shocked,” she said, “but if I had not let you – kiss me that night – on the moon, you might never have known how much – we loved each other or that it was – impossible to forget.”
“You are twisting yourself out of a very difficult situation,” the Duc said accusingly.
But as he spoke, he moved towards Canèda and put his arms round her.
“‘How soon are you going to marry me?” he asked. “I do not intend to wait long.”
“I have not yet accepted your – proposal,” she replied provocatively.
“Are you trying to refuse me?” he asked.
As he spoke his lips moved over the softness of her cheek. Then they outlined the top of her mouth and then her small pointed chin.
It gave her a strange feeling.
Then, as she longed for him to kiss her, her lips ready and yearning for his, he sought the softness of her neck.
He felt the quiver that ran through her as strange sensations made her feel wildly excited yet weak and submissive.
Then, as her breath came quickly from between her lips, he kissed her and once again they were in the light coming from the Heavens and it was impossible to think of anything else but that she was his and they were one person in mind, heart and soul.
Only as Canèda felt
as if the wonder of it was almost too great to be borne did the Duc say in a voice that he tried to keep steady?
“Now tell me when you will marry me.”
“Now! This – moment!”
He laughed and it was a sound of triumph.
“That is what I wanted you to say, my precious one.”
He held her close once again as if enfolding her protectively against the world and against anything that might hurt her.
“I love you! I adore you! I worship you!” he said. “Will you be happy with me on my corner of the moon?”
“I would be happy with you – anywhere – anywhere in the – world,” Canèda replied, “but especially happy on your – moon as long as we can be – together.”
“You may be sure of that,” the Duc answered, “and I am not returning to France without you, just in case you are, as you told me when we first met, a shooting star whom it is impossible to capture.”
He kissed her forehead as he spoke and then he said,
“On your first visit to France you not only found me but discovered your mother’s family, whom you love even though your brother tells me that you went there prepared to hate them.”
“I love them and I feel so – sorry for – them.”
“Before I came to England,” the Duc said, “I talked with the Manager of your grandfather’s estate and with the other landlords in the district. We evolved a plan for the future that will not make the loss of the vines quite as bad as it appears at the moment.”
“I am so, so glad!” Canèda cried. “What can they do?”
“It is a question of a different sort of farming,” the Duc explained. “The land is good and I think they could produce a continuous succession of crops, rather different from those in other regions. Tobacco is one, strawberries are another, besides accelerating the sales of what is a particular luxury in France, truffles.”
Canèda gave a little cry of joy.
“If the Bantôme estate can do all that, then they will not be so hard-up and will not feel so desperate over the loss of their vines.”
“It will mean a lot of hard work and imagination,” the Duc said, “but your Uncle René, whom you have not met, is prepared to make every effort, as I think Armand will when he settles down.”
Canèda gave a little sigh.
“You are so clever,” she smiled, “and with you to help them I know that they will be all right.”
Love in the Moon Page 14
