Читать книгу Scorpion's Dance - Anne Mather, Anne Mather - Страница 7

AS IF IN answer to her unspoken question, Jaime Knevett flexed his shoulder muscles, and said: ‘I seem to have arrived just in time for the wedding, don’t I?’

He spoke English without a trace of an accent, as well he might, she thought broodingly. He had attended school in England, after all, and his father was English. But he didn’t look English. He looked Brazilian, or Portuguese, with that straight uncompromising nose and those fine lips. And yet there was something about his eyes which was wholly alien to either of those nationalities.

‘You’re—staying?’ she asked now, not quite knowing what to do, and he inclined his head gravely. Belatedly, she saw he was wearing a fine mohair dinner jacket, and his shirt front was an intricate mass of pleated lace which contrasted wildly with his hard, wholly masculine features. Was he to attend the ball with them? And why hadn’t Mark told her he was coming?

‘I gather you don’t approve,’ he observed dryly. ‘Haven’t you forgiven me yet?’

Miranda felt the wave of colour sweeping up her neck to her face. ‘I really don’t know what you mean,’ she protested, but patently he didn’t believe her.

‘I think you do,’ he told her insistently, his hands sliding into the pockets of his jacket to leave his thumbs hooked outside. ‘But never mind. You’re almost a member of the family now.’

‘Not your family, Mr Knevett,’ she retorted, and saw the faint smile that lifted the corners of his mouth.

‘You may call me Jaime,’ he said, refusing to argue with her, but she determined he should never have that satisfaction.

Lady Sanders’ appearance curtailed any further conversation between them. Black lace became the older woman very well, although her eyes flicked almost enviously over Miranda in her cream velvet. Mark was evidently well pleased with his fiancée’s appearance, and his hand curved possessively about her waist as he asked Jaime whether he didn’t envy him his good fortune.

Jaime’s response was as enthusiastic as he could have wished, but Miranda was aware of the cynicism in the older man’s gaze, and hated him for it.

The ball was a glittering occasion in the county, and because the Sanders were there, the press were out in force. Miranda was forced to face so many flashbulbs that her head began to feel as if it was exploding, and she hardly noticed who took advantage of Mark’s diverted attention to draw her away to dance. It was such a relief to escape from the pressures of being Lord Sanders’ fiancée that she didn’t particularly care who engineered it.

But once on the dance floor, with Jaime’s arms linked about her waist in the manner of the young people present, she had to press her palms against the soft material of his jacket to keep some breathing space between them.

‘What’s the matter?’ he inquired softly. ‘We’re only dancing.’ But Miranda could not relax.

Her breathing was unaccountably quicker, and she looked round determinedly at the other dancers, endeavouring to dismiss the hardness of Jaime’s thighs close against her own. There were lots of young people present, all dancing in the way they were dancing, the girls often with their arms looped about their partners’ necks, so why she should feel so uncomfortable she had no idea. But she did. It was not as if he was attracted to her, and certainly she despised him. But he possessed a certain animal magnetism which drew the eyes of many women in the room, and she told herself it was this physical manifestation which was causing her intense awareness of his man’s body against hers. She had never felt like this with Mark, but then Mark was so much thinner, less muscular somehow, and he had never held her so closely when they were dancing.

‘Do you—do you intend to stay in England long, Mr Knevett?’ she asked, attempting a casual conversation, and he looked down at her with slightly raised eyebrows.

‘I didn’t think you cared,’ he drawled, and she pressed vainly against the iron bands that encircled her. ‘As a matter of fact,’ he continued, ‘I intended to return home next week, but Mark’s persuaded me to stay until after the wedding.’

Of course. Mark would. Mark had always admired his older cousin, however remote their relationship might be. But Miranda wished that he hadn’t with a strength that far outweighed the importance of that distant childhood humiliation.

‘My aunt tells me you’ve been working in the local library,’ he said, and realising she could not cause a scene here, on the dance floor, Miranda forced herself to look up at him. He was taller than Mark, and her gaze crossed his face, noting the firm line of his jaw and the lean flesh stretched across his cheekbones before reaching his eyes. But those dark brown depths derided her and she wished she dared say something to wipe that mocking amusement from his face. Apparently he agreed with his aunt and could see no reason why Mark should choose to marry someone socially inferior and so obviously unsuitable.

‘What do you do, Mr Knevett?’ she responded coldly. ‘When you’re not making sport of the working classes? Or is honest toil abhorrent to you?’

His expression scarcely registered her taunt. ‘As it is to Mark, you mean?’ he countered provokingly, and she realised she had fallen into a trap of her own making.

‘Mark works,’ she defended her fiancé hotly. ‘The estate—’

‘—is run by a very efficient bailiff,’ he interrupted her mildly. ‘You see, I do know about such things, but I doubt you do.’

Miranda wished the band would get to the end of this particular waltz so she could return to the safety of Mark’s protection. Every minute she spent with Jaime Knevett seemed to deepen the antagonism between them. She didn’t like him, it was true, but he was her fiancé’s cousin, and she suspected Lady Sanders would still use any method within her power to prevent her son from taking such an irrevocable step.

‘As a matter of fact, I’m a doctor, or I shall be when I’ve completed my training.’

Miranda realised Jaime was speaking again and gathered her thoughts. ‘I beg your pardon …’

‘I said—I’m a doctor,’ Jaime repeated, lowering his head so that she could hear him more clearly and in so doing bringing his lips within touching distance of her hair.

The faintly alcohol-scented fumes of his breath fanned her forehead; a not unpleasant sensation, it made her aware of the other scents about him—the soap he used, the spicy tang of his after-shave lotion, the clean male smell of his body. His hair, as straight as her own, needed no artificial preparation, and lay thick and smooth against his head.

All this her senses told her, sensitising her fingertips against his chest, her breasts swelling against his hardness. A wave of heat began in the pit of her stomach and spread to the outermost extremities of her body, firing her blood and quickening the tell-tale beat of her heart. Dear God, she thought weakly, what was the matter with her? She felt quite faint. Surely she was allowing her imagination to run out of all control.

He had noticed her sudden lack of colour, however, and he said sharply: ‘Are you feeling all right?’

Miranda managed to nod. ‘Yes. No. That is—it’s very hot in here, isn’t it?’

‘Is it?’ His eyes compelled hers. ‘Shall I take you back to your fiancé? Or would you rather step out into the corridor for a few minutes?’

Either seemed wholly unsuitable. How could she step outside with Jaime and run the risk of being spotted by scandal-hungry reporters? But equally, how could she go back to Mark like this, her legs unwilling to support her, and trembling like a leaf?

‘There’s an ante-room behind the dais,’ Jaime observed quietly. ‘The band use it in the interval. You could go in there for a few moments, if you’d rather not run the gauntlet of the press.’

The ball was being held at the Fleece, the largest hotel in the town, and the ballroom was used for conferences on other occasions and there were several ante-rooms adjoining.

The size of the hall and the press of people made it possible to slip unnoticed into the ante-room. Miranda stood there in the semi-darkness, unwilling to put on the light, and took several restoring gulps of air. She had expected Jaime would leave her, but he leaned against the wall just inside the doorway, watching her with dark inscrutable eyes.

‘Better now?’ he inquired, after she had expelled her breath on a shuddering sigh, and she looked at him uncertainly.

‘I suppose you’ll tell Mark,’ she said.

‘Tell Mark? Tell him what?’

‘About me. About this.’

‘What about this?’ He straightened away from the wall. ‘Why should you think he would be interested?’

Miranda shook her head. ‘I—don’t know.’

‘Don’t you?’

He didn’t sound wholly convinced, and she flinched when he put out a hand and touched the creamy pallor of her cheek, his thumb probing the quivering contours of her mouth. When her lips parted, the pad of his thumb rubbed against the vulnerable barrier of her teeth, and then withdrew with an abruptness that left her with an aching pang of regret.

‘Come!’ he said. ‘We will be missed. The band has stopped playing.’

Humiliation such as she had never experienced before washed over her. With trembling fingers she smoothed her hair, checked the neckline of her dress and then swept past him out of the ante-room. But she didn’t get far before cruel fingers caught her wrist, and she was jerked round to face—her fiancé!

‘Mark—’ she began in surprise, and then checked at the thunderous expression contorting the normally pleasant features of his face. ‘Mark, what is it?’

‘Little tramp!’ he muttered against her ear. ‘What the hell have you been doing?’

If Miranda had been pale before, she was bright scarlet now. She looked round desperately for Jaime, for once needing him, requiring him to explain.

‘I—we—Jaime—’

‘Jaime, is it?’ Mark sneered. ‘That didn’t take long, did it? My God, I should have listened to my mother when she warned me—’

‘Warned you!’ Miranda stared at him aghast, praying that no one could hear what they were saying above the sound of the beat number the band had started to play. ‘Mark, I don’t know what you mean!’

‘You bloody little fool! Don’t you understand? Haven’t you guessed? Mother asked Jaime to come, not me! She invited him to the Hall, she asked him to stay for the wedding. And not because she dotes on him, because she doesn’t. But because she knows what a sexy swine he is, and how a little tart like you wouldn’t be able to resist his flattery!’

‘No!’ Miranda put a shocked hand to her mouth. ‘No, that’s not true! Mark, I swear to you—’

‘What do you swear?’ he taunted, swaying a little as he spoke, and she realised to her dismay that already he had drunk more than was good for him. ‘That you weren’t attracted to him? That you didn’t spend the whole of the last dance gazing up at him, moon-faced? That you haven’t been missing for a quarter of an hour since the dance ended?’

‘I felt faint—’ she began desperately, and Mark nodded vigorously.

‘I bet you did,’ he muttered. ‘And to think I thought you were saving yourself for me!’

Miranda looked about them despairingly. Reason told her that Mark didn’t mean all the things he was saying, but that didn’t make them any the less painful. Painful too was the realisation that he might be right about his cousin, and that hurt most of all. If she could only get him out of here, away from all these people, she might to able to convince him he was wrong.

‘Mark, we have to talk,’ she said, in a low forceful tone. ‘Now—do you want it to be here, where everyone can see us? Hear us?’

Mark looked at her suspiciously. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Oh, Mark!’ She stared at him appealingly. ‘Can’t you see? You’re reacting exactly how they want you to react! I’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. Don’t you believe me?’

Even as she said the words, she wondered if she was being strictly honest. But this was a dirty game she was involved in, and she had to use the cards as they were played to her. Her own reactions to Jaime Knevett she would take out and examine at some other time, but right now she had to make Mark understand how he was being manipulated.

Mark was breathing heavily, the amount of alcohol he had consumed befuddling his brain, making it difficult for him to think clearly. He wanted to believe her. He had never cared for any girl the way he cared for her. In fact, girls had never figured too prominently in his life until she came along. He had much preferred fast cars and horse racing, and the company of his friends. But he was tired of those pursuits, and it had been a novelty taking out someone of whom he knew his mother disapproved. She had always chosen his friends for him, but he was sick and tired of that arrangement. Miranda had been a heaven-sent opportunity, a chance to escape from his mother’s cloying possessiveness.

‘All right,’ he said heavily. ‘Let’s go to the car. We can talk there.’

Miranda would have chosen anywhere but there, but she had no choice in the matter. So long as Mark was prepared to talk, there was a chance she could persuade him he was wrong. And unless she wanted the break-up of their engagement, and the subsequent gossip that would arouse, she had to go along with him.

It was cold outside. Avoiding the main corridors of the hotel meant leaving her cloak behind, and Miranda was shivering when they climbed into the sports car. She had seen Mark’s mother watching them as they left the ballroom, and the look on her face had confirmed Miranda’s worst fears. Lady Sanders would not give up while there was still a chance she might be able to split them up.

Mark put his keys in the ignition and started the car, and Miranda looked at him in consternation. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Car’s cold,’ he said. ‘We’ll warm up the engine, then we’ll talk.’

‘But Mark …’

She bit into her lower lip anxiously, and he gave her a derisive stare. ‘What’s the matter? Think I’m too drunk to drive or something?’

She sighed. ‘Frankly, yes.’

Mark shook his head. ‘You worry too much. I know exactly what I’m doing.’

Miranda wished she could be sure. Staring out of the frosted window, she wondered where Lady Sanders thought they had gone. Perhaps she would send Jaime to look for them. Jaime! Miranda’s lips tightened. How she would like to see him humiliated just once in his life!

Mark had stopped at the traffic lights and was looking at her in the light cast by the street lamps. ‘You’re beautiful,’ he said, as if he had just realised the fact, and she forced a faint smile although her lips felt stiff and unresponsive.

Then the lights changed and they were moving again, faster now as the outskirts of the town were left behind them, and the open road invited greater speed. Miranda fastened the safety belt and gripped the seat tightly with her fingers. She would not ask him to slow down, she told herself fiercely. If he killed them both now, she would at least have the satisfaction of knowing that Lady Sanders had not won. She felt curiously fatalistic, and it was almost a shock to see the lights of the village ahead of them and to know that they had arrived safely.

‘Wh-where are we going?’ she ventured, speaking for the first time when he drove past the turning to the Hall, and he heaved a half regretful sigh.

‘You’ll see,’ he said, and slowed to a standstill before the cottage he had bought for her mother.

Miranda caught her breath. ‘Here?’

‘Why not? It’s mine, isn’t it?’

‘Well, yes, but—’

‘The decorators have been here all day. The place is bound to be warm. It’s as good a place as any to talk, isn’t it?’

Miranda made no reply, and he thrust open his door and climbed out. As she joined him, she wondered how many pairs of curtains twitched as their owners espied the visitors to the cottage, and she cringed at the thought of her mother being regaled with the information.

Inside, as he had said, it was warm, and there was the pungent odour of new paint. Central heating had been installed, and the radiators still retained an atom of heat. But it was the gas fire in the living room which really dispelled the draughts, and illuminated the shadowy corners of the room. Mark had not put on the light as there were no curtains as yet at the windows, but the firelight was enough.

Two planks were fixed horizontally between two pairs of steps and the painters had spread the planks with an old piece of carpeting they had found to make a seat. Mark sat down on the planks and beckoned to Miranda to join him. She looked doubtfully at her cream gown and then at the grubby carpeting. Obviously it would stain, but if Mark was prepared to risk it, so must she.

‘So,’ he said, turning sideways to look at her. ‘Here we are.’

‘Yes.’ She sought about desperately for some way to begin this. ‘Mark, I want you to know—’

She broke off suddenly when he leaned towards her and pressed his lips to the side of her neck. It was a totally unexpected caress, and her tension melted.

‘You—believe me?’ she breathed.

‘Let’s say I’m prepared to be persuaded,’ he responded, his voice thickening somewhat. ‘You can tell me first what you were doing with that half-breed cousin of mine!’

Miranda caught her breath. ‘Mark! Don’t say things like that.’

‘Why not? It’s true.’ His lower lip jutted aggressively. ‘Is that why you found him so attractive? They say women like that sort of thing!’

Miranda sighed. ‘Mark! I’ve told you what happened. I felt faint and—and Mr Knevett suggested I stepped outside for a few minutes, that’s all.’

‘All?’ Mark’s lips curled even as his fingers probed the nape of her neck before sliding down to linger suggestively on the swelling mounds of her breasts. ‘And what did you do while you were—outside?’

‘Nothing!’ Miranda’s unease returned in full measure. ‘What do you think we did? What could we do?’

‘I could think of a lot of things,’ replied Mark with a sneer. ‘This, for instance,’ and he slid his hand inside the neckline of her gown to cup the rounded softness of her breast.

Miranda froze. His hand inside her gown aroused nothing but a feeling of distaste inside her, and the derisive twisting of his mouth revealed that he was aware of her revulsion.

‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded, leaning towards her. ‘Don’t you like me to touch you? Don’t you want me to see how desirable you are?’

‘Mark, this has gone far enough—’

‘No, damn you, it hasn’t,’ he snapped violently. ‘Not half far enough!’

With a muffled exclamation his arms were around her, forcing her back on the planks until her shoulder blades were digging painfully into the wood. Then he threw himself upon her, his lips wet and slippery against the shrinking coldness of her flesh.

Miranda was so shocked that for minutes she could do nothing but lie there. Then, as his intentions became clear to her, she began to struggle desperately, digging her nails into his arms, fighting in any way she could to escape his revolting caresses. He was no longer the gentle man she had imagined him to be, but a drink-crazed beast who cared for nothing but his own sexual appeasement.

And she was no match for him. Slender though he was, he had no difficulty in overcoming her frantic efforts to evade him, and tears were streaming down her face when she heard his groan of defeat. Not understanding, she was too shocked and shaking to move when he rolled off her, buttoning his clothes and muttering to himself in tones of distress.

Blinking, hardly capable of coherent thought, she propped herself up on one elbow, staring at him through the wild disorder of her hair. Holding the bodice of her gown together with trembling fingers, she thought at first he had come to his senses, but the ravaged face he turned to her disabused her of that fact.

‘M-Mark!’ she got out unsteadily, but his face just contorted more savagely.

‘Don’t speak to me!’ He spat the words at her. ‘Don’t speak to me!’

Miranda pushed back her hair with an unsteady hand and got to her feet. ‘Mark, you’re drunk—’

‘Drunk, am I?’ He lurched a step towards her, and then shaking his head, he stared broodingly down at the floor.

‘Drunk! Huh, that’s a laugh! God, I wish I was!’

Miranda was trying to understand what he was saying, but her mind wouldn’t work very well. Yet common sense told her that something had happened to bring Mark to his senses, and she desperately wanted to find some good in this awful mess.

‘Mark, you’ll feel better in the morning—’

‘Will I? Will I?’ He glared at her. ‘What do you know about it? What do you know about anything?’ His breathing had quickened again, and as she watched him she saw to her astonishment that there were tears in his eyes.

It was a revealing moment, and compassion swept over her, dispelling the revulsion she had felt for him. ‘Mark, let me help you—’

‘You! Help me?’ His laugh was bitter. ‘I don’t need your help. I don’t want you. I don’t need you. I never did. Don’t you understand, I don’t need anyone!’ And with a muttered oath he flung himself across the room and out the door.

Miranda stared after him blankly, not immediately comprehending the import of what he was saying. But suddenly she knew, suddenly she guessed why he had not finished what he had started. He couldn’t! That was what was eating him up. He couldn’t love anyone.

She turned back to the fire, her hands pressed to her mouth, and as she did so she heard the sound of the sports car starting up outside. With a cry, she turned and darted to the door. He couldn’t go! He couldn’t leave her here like this, without even a coat to cover her torn gown.

But he had. The tail lights of the sports car were already disappearing into the light mist which had fallen when she reached the door, and she stood there watching them until they disappeared from sight. Then she turned and went back into the cottage.

There was no phone, so she could not even ring her mother to ask someone to come and get her. But equally, she could not spend the night here. Apart from anything else, her mother would worry about her, and besides, she wanted to get home, to close the door of her own room and shake away the horrifying implications of the night’s revelations.

She turned out the gas fire, and running combing hands through her hair, walked to the door. The freezing air made her hesitate, and on impulse she went back and gathered up the piece of carpeting to hold like a cloak about her shoulders. Her dress was light, and therefore noticeable, but she couldn’t help that. It was a quarter of a mile to the turn off to the Hall, and another half to the Hall itself.

Miranda had scarcely gone two hundred yards, however, when the headlights of a car picked her up, and she bent her head in agony, praying it was no one she knew. The village attracted a fair number of evening commuters to its two public houses, and it was after closing time.

The car slowed, but she hurried on determinedly, aware of the dangers of a casual pick-up, but when a window was rolled down and a harsh voice said: ‘Miranda!’ she was forced to turn and look.

The car, a red Daimler, was familiar to her. It belonged to Lady Sanders. But Mark’s mother was not driving, she was not even in the car. Jaime Knevett was behind the wheel.

His raking gaze swept her dishevelled appearance, and even in the shadowed street lights she knew she must present a ragged figure. She was reminded of that other occasion when he had seen her torn and bedraggled, and she thought with a rising sense of fury that indirectly he was again the cause of her distress.

‘Get in!’ he said, but she just returned his stare, determined not to be beholden to him for anything. ‘I said—get in!’ he repeated forcefully, and telling herself it was because she was cold and the Hall was still a good distance away and not anything to do with the bleak fury in his eyes, she complied. Gathering her mist-dampened skirts about her, she huddled into the seat beside him, and he leant across her to slam the door with controlled violence.

‘Now,’ he said, his profile hard in the gloomy light, ‘what in God’s name has been going on?’

Miranda cast him a sidelong glance. ‘I’d like to go home,’ she said pointedly, but he ignored her, tossing the disreputable piece of carpet into the back and shrugging out of his own jacket to wrap it about her shoulders. Miranda wanted to protest that she needed nothing from him, but the jacket was so blessedly warm and soft after the scrubby pile of the carpeting that she gave in without argument.

‘If we have to stay here all night, you’re going to tell me where you’ve been,’ he intoned grimly, and she had the feeling he meant it.

‘Don’t you know?’ she demanded, drawing an unsteady breath. ‘Or didn’t your imagination stretch that far?’

‘What do you mean?’

Miranda’s composure was slipping. She didn’t want to sit here discussing what had happened with him. It was still too raw, too vulnerable, and to consider breaking down in front of him was too frightful to be borne.

‘Please,’ she said tremulously, ‘I want to go home. Can’t you restrain your curiosity until the morning? I’m sure Mark will be only too happy to regale you with the details!’

‘Mark?’ His heavy black brows drew together. ‘Mark is responsible for—this?’

His fingers flicked the tangled strands of hair that clung to the mohair of his jacket, but she flinched away from his touch with the nervous mobility of fear. Immediately his eyes narrowed, and uncaring of prying eyes, he switched on the interior light and saw what the masking shadows had concealed. Miranda’s face was pale and haunted, and there were bruises around her throat, just visible above the encompassing shoulders of his jacket. Wordlessly, he tugged the jacket out of her resisting grasp and spread the lapels to reveal the scratches on her arms, and the torn material of the bodice of her dress. Miranda spread her arms crosswise over her breasts, but she had the feeling he was not seeing her as a woman at all, but as the victim of some sexual attack.

With a savage oath, he wrapped the jacket around her again and switched out the light. Then he drew several deep breaths before saying quite calmly: ‘I’ll kill him!’

‘No!’ Somehow from the depths of her being, Miranda managed to articulate the words. ‘It’s not what you think. He … didn’t. That is … he tried to, but … he didn’t.’

Jaime rested his forehead against the steering wheel. ‘Where is he now?’

Miranda shook her head. ‘I don’t know.’

‘You mean he just left you? He put you out of the car …’

‘Oh, no, no!’ Miranda had never felt so weary in her life. ‘We … went to the cottage. Mark … he bought my mother a cottage, you see. Back there.’ She gestured feebly. ‘We went there.’

‘But he left you?’

‘Yes.’ She gulped despairingly. ‘Can I go home now?’

He straightened, flexing his shoulders. ‘In a moment. There’s one more thing.’

‘What?’

‘Why did you assume that I might know what had been going on?’

Miranda sighed. ‘Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps you didn’t.’

Jaime’s mouth was a thin line. ‘Nevertheless, I think I deserve an explanation.’

‘Oh, can’t it wait?’

‘No.’

Miranda shifted restlessly. ‘Why should I give you explanations? You’re on their side, not mine.’

‘I am not on any side,’ he declared coldly. ‘And what is all this talk of sides? You’re marrying Mark, aren’t you? You’ll marry him anyway, whatever he’s done.’

Miranda gasped at the callousness in his voice. ‘Why should you assume that?’ she demanded, but he merely shook his head.

‘I’ll take you home,’ he said, starting the motor. ‘Perhaps we’ll find your fiancé is there, waiting to make amends.’

But Mark was not at the Hall. Only Lady Sanders awaited them, pacing impatiently about the polished floor, and gasping in horror when she saw Miranda’s dishevelled appearance. Miranda had not wanted to confront her future mother-in-law like this. She had wanted to slip round the side of the building and let herself in through the kitchen as she had always done. But Jaime’s hard fingers around her wrist had prevented this, and her strength was too depleted to put up much of a struggle.

‘My God, what’s happened!’ Lady Sanders grasped her shoulder, and then dropped her hand aghast when Miranda winced painfully. ‘There’s been an accident, hasn’t there?’ Her eyes lifted to her nephew’s face. ‘Jaime … tell me! Tell me! Where’s Mark?’

Unhurriedly, Jaime unfastened the studs at his wrists, and folded back his cuffs. ‘I thought you might know that, Aunt Lydia,’ he remarked levelly. ‘I haven’t seen him.’

‘You haven’t? But …’ Lady Sanders gestured towards Miranda. ‘Then how …’ She broke off to moisten her upper lip with her tongue. ‘Miranda! Where is my son?’

Miranda wished the floor would open up and swallow her. She had had just about enough, and she swayed on to her heels. ‘Mark … Mark left me at the cottage,’ she was beginning, when Jaime interrupted her.

‘Don’t you want to know how Miranda got into this condition?’ he inquired, the mildness of his tone belying the glitter of his eyes, but Lady Sanders was in no state to look for hidden meanings.

‘I … well, of course,’ she said agitatedly. ‘If it has any bearing on the matter.’

‘Oh, it has bearing on the matter,’ retorted Jaime tautly. ‘Believe me!’

At last, his aunt seemed to gauge the tenor of his mood, and took a moment to give him her full attention. ‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘What happened?’

Jaime’s nostrils flared. ‘Your son did this,’ he said coldly. ‘Your son attempted to rape his own fiancée! Now why do you suppose he did that?’

Lady Sanders gasped, one hand going automatically to her throat. ‘You can’t be serious!’

‘Oh, but I am,’ declared Jaime heavily, and Miranda felt Lady Sanders’ eyes going over her with almost tangible distaste.

‘How do you know?’ Mark’s mother countered swiftly. ‘Who told you that? You said you hadn’t seen Mark.’

‘Miranda told me—’

‘Oh, please …’ Miranda began to protest again, but they both ignored her.

‘So you’d take her word against the word of my son,’ Lady Sanders was saying now, and Jaime swore violently.

‘We don’t have any word but Miranda’s,’ he retorted. ‘But you don’t imagine she did this to herself, do you?’ and with forceful fingers he plucked his jacket from her shoulders.

It was like a scene from some Victorian melodrama, thought Miranda, an hysterical sob rising in her throat. Behold, the villain’s perfidy! Will wicked Sir Jasper win the day? The difficulty was in deciding who was the wicked Sir Jasper. Was it Mark, the victim of his own inadequacies? Or was it Lady Sanders, whose overriding ambition for her son blinded her to his faults? Or could it possibly be Jaime Knevett, whose motives were as enigmatic as he was? Miranda was too tired to figure it out.

Lady Sanders plucked with nervous fingers at the diamond necklace circling her throat. ‘That still doesn’t explain where Mark has gone, does it? What was this Miranda said about the cottage?’

‘We went to the cottage,’ said Miranda dully. ‘My mother’s cottage. There—there was a scene. Mark left. Afterwards, Mr Knevett found me walking back to the Hall.’

‘How convenient!’ Lady Sanders’ voice was taut with malice, but her nephew intervened.

‘Convenient?’ he asked. ‘Convenient for whom?’

‘Oh, Jaime!’ Lady Sanders waved away his questioning. ‘Don’t get involved in all this.’

‘But I am involved,’ he insisted harshly. ‘However, I do believe no useful purpose is being served by standing here arguing about it. I suggest we allow Miranda to go to bed. She looks—exhausted. We can talk again in the morning.’

‘But what about Mark?’ cried Lady Sanders, aghast. ‘Aren’t you going to look for him?’

‘If you want me to, of course I will,’ he replied gravely. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll escort Miranda to her part of the house.’

‘That’s not necessary—’ Miranda began, but he ignored her, dropping his coat about her shoulders again and urging her forward with his hand in the small of her back.

Miranda was glad to escape from the accusation in Mark’s mother’s eyes. It had been a long evening, a strange evening, and one she never hoped to repeat. But it wasn’t over yet.

Jaime opened the door and accompanied her along the corridor towards the kitchens. But Miranda halted so far along, and turning to him said stiffly: ‘There’s really no need to come any further. I shall be quite all right now.’

In the dim illumination of wall-lights, his face was curiously shadowed, giving it an almost malevolent cast. His eyes seemed deeper set, heavy-lidded, the flaring hollows of his nostrils expelling the heat of his body upon her. She felt suddenly uneasy, apprehensive of the future and she could not dismiss her fears as fancies. She had the overpowering conviction that nothing was ever going to be the same again.

‘Will your mother be up?’ he asked now, and she shivered to dispel the chill that had wrapped itself about her.

‘Perhaps,’ she answered. ‘Does it matter?’

‘Will you explain?’

Miranda bent her head helplessly. ‘I don’t know.’

She heard his harsh intake of breath. ‘You should,’ he said. ‘Then perhaps your mother can bring you to your senses!’

Her head jerked up. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I think you know.’ His eyes were cold, glittering black diamonds in the muted light. ‘You can’t marry Mark now. Not after what’s happened. Not considering what might be to come. I don’t think even becoming mistress of the Hall is worth that, do you, Miranda?’

She gasped. ‘You think I’m marrying him for his money?’

‘Aren’t you?’

‘No!’

‘Oh, come on. You’re not telling me you love that little punk! After what’s happened?’

Miranda’s breasts rose and fell in her agitation, and her fingers holding his jacket in place trembled. She wanted to tear it off and throw it at his feet and trample on it, but the desire to retain her dignity was stronger.

‘You’re his cousin!’ she declared. ‘How can you speak of him like that?’

Jaime’s mouth curled. ‘Our relationship is remote, thank God! Do you think I want to be associated with someone who does this?’

Miranda’s breathing was harsh. ‘He—he didn’t mean it.’ If he did, she didn’t want to admit it. ‘He was drunk—enraged! His mother saw to that.’

‘You’re making excuses for him,’ exclaimed Jaime contemptuously. ‘My God! You’re just like her, aren’t you? His mother! She’s made excuses for him all his life! Well, I wish you well of each other. You deserve everything you get!’

Miranda didn’t know why, but she wanted to crumple up and die. She despised Mark, she didn’t love him. And she despised herself for defending him. But she hated Jaime for making her see herself for what she was.

He was turning away from her in disgust when a low groan reached them. It seemed to come from the kitchen, and with a cry Miranda whirled around and sped along the remaining length of the corridor to where a light was filtering through a crack in the kitchen door. She burst into the room with Jaime right behind her, and then stopped dead at the sight that greeted her stunned eyes.

Her mother was lying on the floor in front of the fire. Mercifully, she had not fallen into the flames, but the flags beneath the polythene tiles were hard and at first Miranda thought she had knocked herself unconscious. But then she saw how one side of her mother’s face had twisted, and spittle was dribbling out of the corner of her mouth.

The sound Miranda made was a kind of choking gulp in her throat, and then Jaime cannoned into her, unable to prevent himself when she stopped so abruptly. The hard warmth of his body dispelled her momentary paralysis, and on shaking legs she moved across the room to kneel down beside Mrs Gresham. But Jaime was there before her, brushing past her and bending to his knees, taking her mother’s wrist between his fingers, probing the rolling sockets of her eyes for any sign of life.

At first Miranda wanted to protest, but then she remembered that he had told her he was a doctor, and she sat back on her heels, staring at him mutely, beseeching him to tell her what was wrong.

‘It looks like a stroke,’ he was saying grimly, when the door behind them burst open again to admit Lady Sanders. But not the Lady Sanders they had left in the hall. This woman was wild-eyed and tearful, lips quivering, hands trembling, a shaking mass of desperation. Grief-stricken fingers tore her handkerchief to shreds, as she cried: ‘Jaime! Jaime! Where are you? Oh, God, Jaime, it’s Mark! Mark! A policeman’s just been to the door. He’s dead, Jaime, he’s dead! Oh, God, what am I going to do?’

She held out her hands towards him, but Miranda who, like Jaime, had got to her feet as Lady Sanders entered the room, reached him first as she sank into a dead faint for the first time in her life.