Читать книгу Solitaire - Сара Крейвен, Sara Craven - Страница 7

MARTY stared at him, her heart beating so wildly that she had the oddest sensation that it might leap into her throat and choke her.

‘But that’s impossible!’ she managed at last.

‘Au contraire, mademoiselle, it is not merely a possibility, but reality.’ He spoke almost wearily. ‘As I suspect you knew before you ever set out on your travels. Accept my felicitations on the depth of your research and commiserations that it has not had the desired effect.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ she said helplessly. ‘But if Uncle Jim really isn’t here, perhaps you can tell me where he has gone.’

The firm mouth curled slightly as if in distaste. ‘You should have continued your research, ma petite, then you would have discovered the answer to that for yourself.’

‘Please stop talking in riddles,’ she begged wearily. ‘I don’t understand what’s going on. You say Uncle Jim sold you this villa a year ago, Did he go away, then?’

The stranger paused, his dark eyes raking over her. ‘Not immediately, no. Is it important?’

‘Yes.’ Marty fumbled at the catch of her shoulder bag. ‘You see, I had a letter from him only three weeks ago asking me to come and live with him and . . .’

He interrupted sharply, his frown deepening. ‘Three weeks? To turn your own words against you, mademoiselle, that is impossible.’

‘But I can show you the letter,’ she began.

‘I am sure you can.’ His look of contemptuous derision scourged her. ‘But I think it’s time I called a halt to this little game you’re playing. Your pretence is in the worst of bad taste under the circumstances. I suppose I can admire your determination to carry it through, but that is all I admire.’

‘I don’t want your admiration.’ In spite of her bewilderment, Marty felt her own temper begin to rise under the lash of the man’s words. How dared he treat her like this! she stormed inwardly. If she had trespassed on his property and his time then it was quite inadvertent. ‘In fact, I don’t want any part of you,’ she went on stonily, ignoring the look of frank scepticism he sent her. ‘If you’ll be good enough’—she stressed the words sarcastically—‘to tell me where Mr Langton has gone, then I’ll be on my way.’

‘Perhaps the truth will shame you into abandoning this ridiculous charade,’ he said harshly. ‘Jacques Langton is dead, mademoiselle, and has been so for the past four months. That is why I know you are a fraud, and that is why I am ordering you to leave—now.’

‘Dead!’ Marty repeated the word mechanically, her mind oblivious to everything else he had said. Then, as the full realisation finally dawned on her, she gave a little anguished cry. ‘Dead? Oh, Uncle Jim, no!’

She gave a desperate look around her at the house, and the brooding pines and the tall inimical figure of the man confronting her, then the great golden disc of the sun came swooping down at her, and she gave a little moan and collapsed to the ground.

The sun seemed to be all about her. She felt as if she was bathed in fire. There were even slow flames forcing themselves between her lips and trickling down her throat, and she began to struggle against them, pushing them away, and pressing her hands to her mouth.

‘Don’t be a little fool.’ She recognised the voice at once, and sat up with a gasp. ‘It’s only cognac. You fainted—remember?’

She was lying on a sofa inside the villa, in a long room full of light. The walls and carpeting were some pale subtle shade between cream and mushroom, and one wall was glass from floor to ceiling giving access to a paved patio. The only real colour in the room came from the abstract paintings hanging on the wall above the empty fireplace, and above the sofa where she was lying, which appeared to be the work of the same artist.

One half of her brain seemed to register these details quite coldly while the other cried out in protest as she did indeed remember only too well what had passed between them. She felt nauseated, and she knew too that she was going to cry, feeling her face begin to crumple like a child’s.

But I can’t, she thought agonisedly, I can’t cry in front of him, even as the first sobs tore harshly at her chest. The tears were slow and scalding at first, grief and shock mingling with loneliness and disappointment as the full extent of her loss came home to her. It was something she was unable to control even though it was a degradation to expose her emotions in front of this man.

At last she sat motionless, her face buried on her arm against the cool leather of the sofa, then with a long quivering sigh she dragged herself upright on to her feet.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said remotely. ‘I—I’ll go now.’

He had been standing with his back to her, staring out of the window and she supposed she should be grateful to him for that.

‘Wait.’ He swung round at the sound of her voice. ‘Either you’re a better actress than I gave you credit for, or I have done you an injustice. Which is it? Tell me the truth.’

‘I don’t have to tell you anything.’ She bent and picked up her bag which was lying on the floor at her feet. ‘What have you done with my case?’

He walked over to her and took her chin in his hand. She wanted to snatch herself away from him, but made herself stand very still and endure his touch.

‘The tears were real,’ he said half to himself. ‘And an actress surely would have learned to cry prettily and not allow her eyes to become swollen and her nose red.’

‘Thank you,’ she said ironically. ‘Now may I go, please?’

‘In a moment. You came here in your own good time. You will depart in mine.’ He released her and walked over to the door. ‘Albertine!’

A thin woman appeared so promptly that she might have been hovering on the threshold waiting for the summons.

He said in French, ‘Take Mademoiselle to the bathroom, and see that she has all that she needs. She has had a great shock.’

The woman nodded, her dark eyes avid with curiosity as they rested on Marty. She tutted briskly and placed a hand on her arm, urging her towards the door.

‘I don’t want to use your bathroom,’ Marty said tightly. ‘I don’t want any help from you. I just want to get away from here.’

He gave her a cool look. ‘You need to wash your face before you do anything, mademoiselle.’

Rebellion welled up in her, but she caught sight of the housekeeper obviously relishing every minute of this passage at arms between her employer and his unexpected guest, and bit back the angry words trembling on her lips.

She accompanied the woman out of the room and into a large hall, its floor coolly tiled. A shallow flight of stairs led up to the first floor, and the woman guided Marty up these and along the gallery above to the bathroom.

Left alone in the bathroom once she had been supplied with a fresh bar of exquisitely scented soap and a small rather harsh-feeling linen towel, Marty stared around at her surroundings. At any other time, she would have been bound to appreciate the exquisite tiling of the walls and floor in shades of beige and rust and amber, as well as the magnificent appointments, including a luxurious shower cubicle, but now it was as much as she could do to run some water in the marble basin and splash it over her face and wrists. Although she hated to admit it, the touch of the water was refreshing, and by the time the woman who she realised must be the Madame Guisard that Jean-Paul had mentioned had returned, the more obvious marks of grief had vanished, although she still looked pale and red-eyed.

As they returned downstairs, Marty saw her case standing in the hall below. It looked forlorn and out of place, stationed next to a large wooden chest that was clearly an antique. As out of place as she was herself, she thought. And what had Uncle Jim had to do with all this restrained elegance?

Madame led her across the hall and tapped almost deferentially on the partially opened door to the salon.

‘Mademoiselle is here, monsieur,’ she annnounced, accompanying the words with a little push as if she sensed Marty’s reluctance to face the new master of the house once again.

‘So I see.’ He was seated, his muscular limbs relaxed in one of the massive hide chairs that flanked the fireplace. ‘You had better bring some tea, Albertine. That is the English stimulant, is it not, and Mademoiselle did not care for the cognac.’

‘I don’t want anything,’ Marty protested.

‘Some tea, Albertine.’ He repeated without haste. He waved a hand at the chair opposite. ‘Be seated, mademoiselle, and let us see if we can get to the bottom of this affair.’

She hesitated for a long moment, then sat down tensely on the very edge of the seat.

He waited until the door had closed behind Madame Guisard, then said in a slightly gentler tone than he had used so far, ‘Is it true that you are the niece of Jacques Langton?’

‘Not exactly.’ Marty moistened her lips. ‘He was my father’s cousin,’ she went on hurriedly, seeing the now familiar look of scepticism on his face. ‘I—I always called him my uncle.’

‘I understand. Under the circumstances I regret that I broke the news of his death to you quite so bluntly.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said quietly. ‘After all, it doesn’t alter anything, and I had to find out some time. There’s no easy way to break that sort of news.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Can you tell me a little more about it?’

He gave a slight shrug. ‘There is little to tell. Jacques had suffered from a weak heart for some time. He had three attacks and the last one killed him. It was very sudden and very quick. Is that what you wanted to know?’

‘I suppose so,’ she said after a pause. ‘I’m glad he wasn’t an invalid for any length of time. He would have hated it so.’

‘That is true.’ He leaned back in his chair, his eyes going over her from head to foot, frankly and deliberately assessing her, so that in spite of herself she felt herself flushing under his all-compassing gaze. ‘What I cannot understand,’ he went on after a moment, ‘is why when I asked Jacques after the first attack if there was anyone in England whom I should contact, he told me there was no one. How do you explain that?’

‘I wouldn’t even begin to try,’ she said rather hopelessly. ‘Any more than I can explain why he should write to me offering me a home that was no longer his.’

‘Are you sure the letter came from him?’

‘Absolutely certain.’

‘May I see it?’

Her handbag was no longer on the floor, but lying on the sofa. She found the letter and passed it to him. As their fingers brushed fleetingly, she was conscious of a curious tingling sensation, and her flush deepened. She tried to tell herself that it was because of her overcharged emotional state that she felt this strange new heightened awareness, but the explanation was not wholly convincing. She found herself glancing at him from beneath her lashes as he sat reading the letter and frowning a little. He seemed completely at ease, but then why shouldn’t he be, in his own home? She was being idiotic. He was quite entitled to behave as he liked, but this did not stop her wishing that he would go and put a shirt on. She had never realised before what an exclusively feminine environment she seemed to have inhabited all her life. Even Mr Leslie whose secretary she had been had been a prissy, old-maidish kind of man, always rather fretfully searching for his pen and his spectacle case.

She had thought Jean-Paul was attractive, but this was before she set eyes upon this man whom even her lack of sophistication could recognise had come to terms with his own virility a long time ago, and no longer needed to prove anything about himself to anyone.

As she watched he reached for a pack of cigarettes on the table beside his chair, and selected one with a practised flick of his wrist. Even that most conventional of movements was enough to set the muscles rippling across his shoulders and chest where the dark mat of hair grew so thickly, tapering down his flat stomach to disappear inside the waistband of his pants.

‘My apologies, mademoiselle. Do you use these things?’

With a start Marty pulled herself out of her disturbing reverie to the realisation that he was holding the pack of cigarettes out to her.

A faint smile was curving his mouth as if he was letting her know that he had been quite well aware of her scrutiny, and that her face had been an open book for the conflicting thoughts and emotions stirring within her.

A wave of colour rose to complete her betrayal as she swiftly shook her head. ‘Thank you, but I don’t smoke.’

‘But how wise,’ he said, still with that faint amusement underlying his words, and making her feel gauche and defenceless. He lit his own cigarette and blew out a cloud of pungent blue smoke before resuming his perusal of her letter. Marty bent her head and stared down at the scuff marks on her dusty sandals. She was beginning to wish that she had made no protest, no attempt to justify her presence here. At least by this time she would have been away from this place, and why the prospect of being alone and almost penniless in a strange country should seem safer than the comparative luxury of her present surroundings was far too complex a question for her to answer to her entire satisfaction in her present confused and emotional state.

She started as the door opened and Madame Guisard came back into the room carrying a tray. In spite of the strange inner conviction that the housekeeper did not approve of her for some reason, Marty could not deny that her preparations for this unwanted tea-party were well-nigh perfect. As well as the hot and fragrant tea with its attendant dish of sliced lemon, there was also a plate of enticing pastries—horns filled with cream and smooth chocolate and pastry shells filled with peaches and cherries and glazed in rich syrup. The housekeeper arranged the tray to her satisfaction on a small table and busied herself with the pouring out of the tea. Marty supposed that she considered the delicate porcelain cups and teapot too fragile to be entrusted to her own tender mercies, nor did she miss the narrow-eyed glance Madame favoured her with as she handed her the cup. And apparently the master of the house did not miss it either, in spite of his preoccupation with the letter. His voice was pitched too low for Marty to catch the words, but the tone was quite plainly dismissive and Madame Guisard left the salon with something of a flounce.

Now that they were alone again the silence between them seemed almost tangible, and Marty felt the tension building up inside her as she waited for him to make some comment. The initiation of any discussion was beyond her, and the fingers that held the delicate handle of her cup shook slightly as she raised her tea to her lips.

‘It’s incredible,’ he said at last. ‘I would swear that this was Jacques’ handwriting, yet it must be a forgery.’

Marty’s heart missed a beat and she set down her cup, staring at him wide-eyed.

‘A forgery—but who on earth would do such a thing?’ She caught the faint derision in the glance he bent upon her and exploded, ‘You think I did it, don’t you?’

‘It seems the most reasonable explanation.’

‘But why?’ She almost wrung her hands in fury. ‘What possible motive could I have for doing such a thing?’

He shrugged. ‘Perhaps because you wanted to attract my attention. If so, your ploy has succeeded admirably, mademoiselle. I congratulate you.’

She loked at him fiercely, her small breasts rising and falling in time with her erratic breathing. ‘You really must be the most abominably arrogant and conceited man it has ever been my misfortune to meet,’ she said, her voice shaking. ‘Do you honestly think that you’re so irresistible that a woman would travel half across Europe simply to be noticed by you, because if so . . .’

‘A number of women have travelled twice that distance—and shown even more determination on their arrival than you have,’ he said dispassionately. ‘Where you differ from them is in your unwillingness to admit that your motives for coming here are not of the purest. I can only guess that Jacques must have written to you before his death telling you to whom he had sold the villa, and your ambition led you to make the best possible use of your information.’

Ambition—motives—information? Marty’s head reeled. Nothing he was saying made the slightest sense, and to her horror she felt the weakness of tears threatening to overcome her again. She couldn’t break down a second time under his ironic gaze. She sprang to her feet.

‘You accused me of playing games, monsieur, but it’s you that seems to enjoy talking in riddles. But I’m afraid your snide insinuations are wasted on me. I came here hoping to find a home and someone to love me, that’s all. Laughable, isn’t it, and I apologise for being so naïve. But if that letter was a fraud and a hoax, then I was the victim, not the perpetrator. And I can assure you I have no desire to pander to your overwhelming ego by adding another name to your list of conquests. I’ll go now. Please don’t bother to show me to the door.’

She took two steps across the salon before his hand descended on her shoulder, turning her forcibly to face him. She gasped in mingled pain and fury as his fingers bruised her flesh.

‘Take your hands off me!’ she raged, her balled fists lifting instinctively to strike at his bare chest.

‘Tais-toi,’ he ordered, his voice as harsh and abrupt as a blow in the face. ‘Calm down for a moment, you little firebrand, and tell me something. What’s my name?’

His hand snaked down and closed around both her slender wrists, holding them in a paralysing grip as he stared down into her face. He was holding her so close to him that she could feel the warmth from his half-bared body on her own skin. This new proximity was too sudden, too intimate, she found herself thinking wildly.

‘I said what’s my name?’ The dark face came threateningly near her, his piercing eyes seeming to mesmerise her.

‘How should I know?’ she flung back at him. ‘Don Juan, I suppose, or Casanova. They both seem eminently suitable.’

‘Try Luc Dumarais.’ His eyes continued to bore relentlessly into hers while the grip on her wrists increased in pressure until she thought she would be forced to cry out if he did not let her go. He seemed to be awaiting a particular response from her, but for the life of her she could not guess what it was.

‘Is that supposed to mean something to me?’ she asked at last.

‘Perhaps. Perhaps not.’ The black brows were drawn together frowningly, but to her relief that crushing grasp of her wrists had slackened. ‘You don’t go to the cinema?’

She shook her head, her startled eyes searching his face. ‘Is that … I mean, are you a film star?’

He gestured impatiently. ‘God spare me that! I’m a director. And you? If you’re another would-be actress looking for a part in my next film, you’d better confess now.’

‘An actress?’ She closed her eyes for a moment. ‘You must be mad! I’ve never been on a stage in my life.’ Not since, she thought achingly, that abortive chance she’d been offered as a child at school. She managed an unsteady laugh. ‘I could hardly look less like an embryo film star.’

‘It is no longer necessary to look like a carbon copy of Bardot,’ he said drily. ‘Your clothes are poor and your hair is badly cut, but with a little attention you would not be unattractive.’

She flushed angrily, pulling herself free from his slackened grasp. She was quite well aware of her own shortcomings, she thought furiously. She didn’t need to have them pointed out by this arrogant Frenchman, even if he was a film director as he claimed. And she had to admit that for all she knew he could be all he said and more. Aunt Mary had considered the price of cinema seats a sinful waste of money and had reacted in horror against the permissive trend in what was being shown at a great many film centres. Within this context, all foreign films had been a particular anathema to her, and Marty had never even been allowed to watch any of the great classics of the genre shown on television.

‘Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’ve never heard of you,’ she said with childish ungraciousness, and saw his firm lips twist in wry acknowledgment.

‘I believe you,’ he said. ‘I don’t think even an experienced actress could have managed that look of total blankness when you heard my name. So I acquit you of coming here with an ulterior motive.’

‘Thank you!’ She concentrated as much acid as she was capable of in her tone.

‘But that still does not explain the letter.’ He walked back to his chair and picked it up, studying it yet again, then turning his attention to the envelope.

‘The letter is undated, but there is a postmark,’ he remarked at last. ‘Curious. It was posted in Les Sables just over a month ago.’

Marty moved her shoulders wearily. ‘Someone’s idea of a cruel joke, I suppose,’ she said. ‘I hope whoever it is will be delighted with their success.’

‘I think not,’ he said abruptly. ‘As I said before, no one here knew of your existence. Jacques never mentioned you, and as far as we all knew he died without kin.’

‘He was always a loner,’ Marty said tiredly. ‘He—he travelled a great deal all his life and seemed to find it difficult to put down roots. But he always promised that when he finally made a settled home for himself, he would send for me.’

‘And you believed him?’

She looked at him in bewilderment. ‘Of course. Uncle Jim wouldn’t lie to me.’

‘I didn’t mean that. I meant that you believed he would be capable of creating this stable environment that you desired so greatly. You never paused to ask yourself whether this was the right thing to ask of such a man—a loner, as you yourself have said—a nomad even. You never asked yourself whether such a leopard would be able to change his spots?’

‘No, I never did.’ It was shaming to have to confess her lack of perception, her stubborn refusal to accept that the doubts Aunt Mary had raised had been valid ones. She had been too ready to blame them on prejudice, and had failed to see that they were not without foundation. She cleared her throat. ‘Why did Uncle Jim sell the villa to you?’

‘He needed the money,’ he returned with brutal frankness. ‘The flower farm had been a failure, although he tried hard enough to make a success of it, and he was deeply in debt. We had met some months before when I was staying in the locality and he knew I was looking for a house, so we came to an arrangement.’ His hand came out and lifted her chin gently. ‘If it is any consolation to you,’ he said quietly, ‘he clearly intended that you should have the best. I have not altered the house at all since I moved in except to install my own furniture. It took all the money he had been able to save in a lifetime and all he could borrow as well to buy this villa.’

‘But why?’ Marty fought her tears. ‘I didn’t want—all this. I would have been content with something far smaller—humbler.’

‘But maybe he could not,’ he said. ‘Perhaps a promise made to a child assumed paramount importance in his life, in his thinking. Perhaps when you make a dream come true for someone, there should be no half measures. And perhaps too he knew he did not have a great deal of time left. According to the letter, this was meant to be your inheritance.’

‘You’re talking now as if you believe Uncle Jim really did write that letter!’

He shrugged. ‘What other rational conclusion is there? All that remains to be explained is the lapse of time between the writing, and its posting.’ He paused and she saw an intentness in his expression as if he was listening to something. He released her and with a fierce gesture to her to keep silence, he strode swiftly and quietly towards the door of the salon, jerking it open.

Marty heard him speaking to someone in French, his voice like a whiplash, and she quailed. Surely the austere Madame Guisard didn’t descend to listening at keyholes, she thought, a hysterical desire to laugh welling up inside her.

But when Luc Dumarais reappeared he was holding the arm of a young boy, thin and dark-haired, the slenderness of his wrists and ankles betraying how brief the journey he had taken so far towards adolescence. His mouth set and mutinous, he glared up at the man who was thrusting him mercilessly towards where Marty was standing, open mouthed.

‘I have the honour to present my son Bernard, mademoiselle,’ Luc Dumarais said tightly. ‘His interest in the matter we have been discussing leads me to think he could shed some light on the problem that has been perplexing us.’ He picked up the letter and the envelope and held them out to the boy, who stared at them sullenly.

‘Alors, Bernard,’ his father said almost silkily. ‘Did you send this letter to Mademoiselle Langton?’

There was a long silence. Bernard’s slightly sallow complexion took on a deep guilty flush. His lips parted slightly, but no sound came out.

Marty felt suddenly sorry for him. ‘It’s all right, Bernard,’ she said, trying to sound encouraging. ‘I’m sure you meant well and …’

‘I did not mean anything,’ he interrupted flatly in heavily accented English. ‘I found the letter in a book that Jacques gave me. I thought that I would send it, that was all.’

‘How long ago did you find it?’ Luc Dumarais demanded.

Bernard shrugged, his face peevish. ‘I don’t remember. A long time ago—just after he died.’

‘And it did not occur to you that a more proper course of action would have been to give me the letter, so that I could pass it on to the lawyer who was dealing with Jacques’ affairs?’ Luc said coldly.

‘Why should I?’ Bernard flung his head back defiantly and faced his father. ‘The letter was not written to you. It was not your business.’

‘Or yours,’ Luc Dumarais returned harshly. ‘Yet you chose to make it so.’

Bernard shrugged again. ‘I did not know what was in it,’ he muttered defensively. ‘I did not know that Mademoiselle would be fool enough to come here. Who is she?’ he added. ‘Jacques’ mistress?’

Almost before he had finished speaking, Luc’s hand shot out and slapped him across the face. The boy staggered back wincing with a gasp that was echoed by Marty’s.

She whirled on Luc. ‘There was no need for that, surely!’

‘There was every need.’ His voice sounded weary. ‘Or are you accustomed to be insulted in such a manner?’

‘No, of course not.’ Marty was taken aback. ‘But he didn’t mean it.’

Luc’s smile held no amusement whatsoever. ‘He meant it.’ He turned and gave his son who was standing, his fingers pressed to his cheek, a long hard look. ‘As he always means every word of the mischief he makes. Pauvre Bernard! Were you so lost for ways to anger me that you had to send all the way to England? Involve a complete stranger?’

‘Well, it has been a success, tout de měme,’ the boy burst out suddenly, and Marty was horrified at the malice in his voice. ‘For now this girl has come, and you will have to deal with her, mon père.’ He turned and ran out of the room, banging the salon door behind him.

Marty heard Luc Dumarais swear softly under his breath before he swung back to face her.

‘As you see, mademoiselle,’ he said coldly, ‘your intervention on my son’s behalf was quite unnecessary. He has his own weapons.’

Marty spread her hands out helplessly in front of her. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said inadequately.

‘There is no need,’ he said impatiently. ‘It is I who must apologise to you as it was my son who has brought you on this wild goose chase.’

‘But why should he do such a thing?’

‘You heard,’ he said. ‘To annoy me. To disrupt the peace I have tried to establish here. To cause me yet more problems, and eventually to prove such a thorn in my flesh that I will willingly send him back to Paris to his mother’s family.’

‘And you aren’t prepared to do that?’ Marty ventured.

‘No, I am not.’ Luc Dumarais stretched tiredly. He did not volunteer any further explanation and his dark face was so harsh and strained suddenly that Marty did not dare probe further.

There was a long silence. It was eventually broken by Luc, and Marty had the impression that he was forcing himself back from some bitter journey into the past. She tried to remember what Jean-Paul had said about the household while she was still under the mistaken impression that his remarks referred to Uncle Jim. He had spoken of a divorce, she thought, and also that Bernard’s mother was dead. He had also given her the feeling that Bernard would not welcome her presence. But then, she thought, Bernard would not be welcoming to anyone. Brief though their meeting had been, she had sensed an air of resentment and hostility which seemed to encompass the world at large.

‘Now we must decide what must be done with you.’ He sounded resigned.

‘That’s easily settled.’ Marty tried to shut out of her mind the chilling realisation of just how much she had staked on this trip and the pitiful amount of money now left to her. ‘I—I shall return to England. There really isn’t any need to concern yourself …’

‘Don’t be a fool.’ His voice bit at her. ‘My son was to blame for bringing you here. The responsibility now rests with me. Just how do you propose to return to England? Did you buy a return ticket for the ferry?’

‘No,’ she admitted. ‘But that’s no problem.’ She tried to sound careless—a seasoned traveller, and saw his eyes narrow speculatively as he looked her over.

‘You have travellers’ cheques?’ he asked pleasantly. ‘Or are your resources restricted to those few francs you have in your bag?’

For a moment she was stunned, then she blazed at him. ‘You dared—you actually dared to look in my bag?’

‘Yes, I dared,’ he said calmly. ‘I wished to check your passport and make sure you had a right to the identity you were claiming. Or did you think I would trustingly let any strange waif into my house, merely because she professed kinship with a man no longer alive to support or deny her claim? It seemed to me that you had planned only on a one-way trip.’

‘The more fool I,’ she said tightly. ‘But it really isn’t any of your concern. I’m sure if I really had been an actress with an eye on a part in your latest film you would have thrown me out without a second thought. Just because Martina Langton, starlet, doesn’t exist, Martina Langton, secretary, doesn’t require your charity either.’

‘There are arrangements you can make? Relatives in England you can cable for money?’

Marty suppressed a wry smile as she visualised Aunt Mary’s reaction to any such demand.

‘No, there’s no one,’ she acknowledged quietly. ‘But I’ll manage. I’m quite capable of working, you know, and Les Sables is a seaside resort. I can get a job at one of the hotels—waiting at tables perhaps, or as a chambermaid.’

‘Les Sables is a small resort. Most of the hotels are family businesses and do not make a habit of employing outsiders, especially foreigners. Any casual work available has already been snapped up by students,’ he said unemotionally. ‘What other ideas have you?’

‘None,’ she was provoked into admitting. She lifted her chin defiantly and looked at him. ‘But I’ll think of something.’

‘I have already thought of something.’ His voice was cool and almost dispassionate. ‘You can remain here.’