Call of the Heart Page 6

  She could see the carved posts of the bed in which she was lying, a marble mantel-piece of exquisite design, and above it a picture of brilliant colours.

  She shut her eyes.

  It must all be part of her dream.

  Then because she was curious she looked again, only to find that the mantel-piece and the picture were still there.

  “If you are awake,” a quiet voice said beside her, “I have something for you to drink.”

  Now Lalitha remembered that she had heard that voice before. It had been a part of her dreams. She had obeyed it instinctively.

  An arm was slipped gently behind her shoulders and her head was raised a little to drink from a glass that was held to her lips.

  Again she recognised something that had been in her dreams—the sweetness of honey in a cool liquid which had quenched her thirst.

  “Where . . . am . . . I?” she managed to say weakly as the glass was taken away.

  As she spoke she looked up and saw the face of an elderly woman who was smiling at her.

  “You are at Roth Park.”

  “Where?”

  “We brought you here, M’Lady.”

  “But . . . why?” Lalitha tried to say, and then she remembered. There had been the drive to the Church-yard, the strange, unaccountable feeling of her first kiss, then the terror of being dragged up the aisle and the words of the marriage-service.

  She had been married!

  She felt, for a moment, a shaft of fear strike through her

  He had been angry, very angry, and she had been afraid.... Then she had written a letter ... a letter to Sophie! ...

  Had she sent it? What had happened?

  She could remember crying out in sudden terror at something that she had said; something that was wrong; something that she had promised never to reveal.

  It was beginning to come back to her, but there were gaps ... gaps that were part of her fear, which was why she knew that she was afraid to remember them.

  “I am going to order you some food,” said the quiet voice beside her. “You will feel better when you have eaten.”

  Lalitha wanted to protest that she was not hungry.

  The drink she had just had was delicious; she could still feel the sweetness of it on her tongue and it had invigorated her so that she was thinking more clearly.

  She knew that the elderly woman rang the bell and gave instructions to someone at the door.

  Then she came back to the bed-side.

  “Are you still wondering how you got here?” the woman asked.

  Lalitha looked at her and said:

  “Am I. . . not in ... London?”

  “No, indeed,” the elderly woman answered. “You are on His Lordship’s Estates in Hertfordshire.”

  “His ... Lordship?”

  The words made Lalitha quiver.

  Now she remembered. It was Lord Rothwyn she had married. The Nobleman whom Sophie had jilted at the last moment.

  The dark, angry, overwhelming man who had set a trap for Sophie and who had frightened her into marriage.

  “How could he have done such a thing?” she asked herself. “What can Sophie have thought when she realised that she had been tricked?”

  The question made her think of Lady Studley and she trembled.

  “Does . . . does my Step-mother . . . know where I . . . am?” she asked in a voice that was little above a whisper.

  “I don’t know,” the elderly woman answered, “and you need not worry about her or anyone else. His Lordship is looking after you.”

  “He-he was ... so angry,” Lalitha said.

  “He is not angry now,” she was assured. “He just wishes for Your Ladyship to get well.”

  There was something comforting in knowing that he was no longer angry.

  Lalitha shut her eyes and fell asleep.

  When she opened them again there was food waiting for her.

  She was still not hungry but to please the elderly woman she tried to eat a few mouthfuls and succeeded.

  Then she slept again, drifting away into a dream-land where her mother was waiting for her and no fear existed.

  It was the following morning before she really felt that the clouds had moved away from her head and she could think more clearly.

  The room was even more beautiful than it had appeared at first glance.

  The white and gold walls, the pink hangings which matched the carpet, the huge, gold-framed mirrors; the pictures and flowers, all were part of an ideal room she had sometimes imagined owning but which never before had she actually seen.

  Now she learnt that the elderly woman who attended to her had been Lord Rothwyn’s Nurse.

  “A sweet little boy he was, and ‘Nattie’ was one of the first words he ever said. It’s stuck to me ever since!”

  She brought Lalitha some breakfast and set it down beside her on the big bed.

  Lalitha stared at it, yet for a moment she did not see the fine Worcester china, the gleaming silver, and exquisitely embroidered cloth.

  Instead she saw the food she had eaten having cooked it herself on the dirty, unscrubbed kitchen-table at the house on Hill Street.

  What would her Step-mother be thinking of her now that she was not there?

  What explanations had been given when she had not returned?

  What would they say to her when she saw them again? Because she was frightened by such questions she forced them to the back of her mind and tried to listen to what Nattie was saying to her.

  “You’ve got to fatten yourself up, M’Lady! Already you have put on a little weight!”

  Lalitha stared at her, her eyes wide.

  “How could I . . . have . . .” she began, and then asked in a tense voice: “How long have I . . . been here?”

  “Nearly three weeks.”

  Lalitha started in such amazement that the china on the tray rattled.

  “It cannot be true! Three weeks! But why? How can it have ... happened?”

  “You have been ill,” Nattie replied. “It’s what the Physician described as ‘exhaustion of the brain,’ but we didn’t pay much attention to him, although His Lordship insisted on consulting him.”

  She paused, and as if she realised that Lalitha was waiting for her to explain she went on:

  “It’s the Herb-Woman who has been treating you, M’Lady. You won’t recognise your back when you see it in the mirror.”

  “The Herb-Woman?” Lalitha repeated, thinking to herself that she must be stupid as she still could not understand what had happened.

  “Famous she is in these parts,” Nattie went on, “and people come down from London for her to cure their complaints with her herbs. She won’t allow anyone to use Doctors’ medicines. A lot of rubbish, she calls them!”

  “Is it herbs that you have been giving me to drink?” Lalitha asked. “Even though I was unconscious I somehow knew they were delicious!”

  “Herbs and fruits from her garden,” Nattie said, “and honey from her bees. She would not use anyone else’s. Says they have special healing powers.”

  Lalitha was silent for a moment and then she said: “You say I am ... fatter?”

  “A little,” Nattie answered, “and it’s an improvement.”

  She went to the dressing-table and picked up a small mirror with a gold frame surmounted by dancing angels.

  She carried it across the room and held it in front of Lalitha so that she could see herself.

  It was a very different reflection from the one she had last seen in her bed-room on Hill Street.

  At that time the skin of her face had seemed taut over the prominent bones. Her eyes, red and inflamed, had been half closed, and her hair had fallen in lank strands to her shoulders. Now her eyes seemed almost to fill her small face, and although the line of her chin was sharp, her skin was translucently clear and had a faint flush of colour.

  Her hair seemed fuller and more buoyant with a slight wave. It was parted in the centre and fell on each side of he
r face.

  “I look... different!” she said at last.

  “You will look very different before I’ve finished with you!” Nattie promised. “But you will have to do as I say!”

  Lalitha smiled.

  She knew that half-bullying, half-affectionate note which every Nurse used to her charges.

  It was just the way her own Nurse had spoken to her and it, hid a tenderness which she had never received from anyone else.

  She knew it was love, in some ways like the love she had received from her mother, and in another way different, because Nurse would never ‘stand any nonsense.’

  “I will do what... you tell me,” she said. “I want to get... well.”

  Even as she spoke she wondered if that was really true.

  If she were well, would there not be problems to face? And one problem was greater than all the others.

  She did not even have to express it to herself; she just knew that the thought of him, large, frightening, and angry, was there, however much she might try to escape from it.

  Nattie brought her a fresh night-gown, an elegant creation of soft lawn trimmed with lace, and brushed her hair.

  Before she did so she rubbed into it a lotion which she said the Herb-Woman had given her.

  “What is it?” Lalitha asked.

  “Cinquefoil, or as we used to call it as children, ‘Fivefingered grass,’ ” Nattie replied. “It is the herb of Jupiter.”

  “Does it really make the hair grow?” Lalitha enquired.

  “Your hair has grown quite considerably since you have been ill,” Nattie replied. “But then it always does when a body is unconscious.”

  “I never knew that!” Lalitha exclaimed.

  “It’s true!”

  “How could I have been unconscious for so long?”

  “You could have awakened after a time, but you would only have been confused and unhappy, so we kept Your Ladyship asleep.”

  “With herbs, of course!” Lalitha said with a smile.

  “Sleep is the healing of the Lord,” Nattie said, “but we assisted Him a little.”

  “What did the Herb-Woman give me for that?” Lalitha enquired curiously.

  “I think it was privet, St. John’s Wort, and white poppy,” Nattie answered, “but you will have to ask her yourself. Although she does not always give her secrets away.”

  Nattie brushed Lalitha’s hair until she felt that it was almost dancing around her shoulders; then, because so much attention had tired her, she slept again.

  When she awoke it was afternoon.

  Tea was brought in and tiny sandwiches, again exquisitely served. When she had finished it Nattie said:

  “His Lordship would like to speak to you.”

  “His ... Lordship?” Lalitha could hardly breathe the words. Instinctively her hands went up to her breast, as if she would protect herself.

  “He has been to see you every day,” Nattie went on, “to watch your improvement.”

  She gave a little laugh.

  “It was almost as if Your Ladyship were one of those buildings on which he spends so much of his time! ”

  Lalitha could not answer.

  She was trembling.

  How could she see Lord Rothwyn? What could she say to him?

  A sudden thought came to her.

  He would want to discuss the future and how he could be rid of her.

  She hardly noticed that Nattie had brought from a drawer a wrap made of chiffon and trimmed with wide lace, which she put round her shoulders.

  She tidied Lalitha’s hair again and then patted the pillows behind her.

  Then, as if she knew instinctively that he was approaching the door, she reached it even as he knocked.

  “Come in, M’Lord.”

  She opened it for him and he walked in.

  Lalitha held her breath.

  She had somehow expected him to be in black, as he had been that night at the Church.

  She remembered his flapping cape which had reminded her of the wings of a bat.

  But instead he was wearing riding-clothes. A cutaway blue coat, high cravat, and white turn-overs to his polished boots made him vastly elegant and at the same time much less frightening.

  It was a second before she could force herself to look at his face, to find that his expression was no longer that of a devil. Instead she had to admit that he was the most handsome man she had ever seen. But he was still tall and overwhelming and he made her feel very small and insignificant.

  She did in fact look very unsubstantial and fragile in the great bed with its canopy of carved angels and its embroidered curtains of pink velvet.

  The afternoon sun-shine gave the room a golden glow but still Lalitha looked shadowy.

  Lord Rothwyn told himself that he had never seen a woman with such strangely coloured hair.

  It seemed almost grey, and her eyes were grey too. The deep, dark grey of a rough sea with a translucent light behind them.

  “I am so glad to see you are better,” Lord Rothwyn said in his deep voice.

  He saw that Lalitha’s hands with their long fingers were holding the chiffon wrap closely against her breasts, and while her lips were parted she was finding it impossible to answer him.

  “You have caused Nattie and me a great deal of anxiety,” he said as if he were giving her time to compose herself. “But now every day we can see an improvement. Soon you will feel well enough to come outside and inspect my gardens. They are very beautiful at this time of the year.”

  “I...I would like ... that,” Lalitha managed to say.

  “Then you must do exactly as Nattie tells you,” Lord Rothwyn said. “It is something I have been obliged to do all my life!”

  He smiled and a faint smile in response touched Lalitha’s lips.

  Then, as she felt he was waiting for her to say more, she added:

  “I... am ... sorry!”

  “There is nothing to be sorry about. It is I who should be apologising to you.”

  “I . . . should have . . . stopped you,” Lalitha murmured. “I was thinking this . . . afternoon about what . . . happened. It was very wrong of me to let you . . . do it.”

  “You could not help yourself,” he said, making no pretence that he did not know that she was talking of their wedding.

  “It was . . . cowardly of . . . me,” Lalitha said. “Mama would have been ... ashamed of ... me.”

  She spoke without thinking. Then he saw the fear come into her large eyes.

  He walked to the bed and sat down on a chair, drawing it near to her.

  “We are married, Lalitha,” he said, “and therefore there should be no pretence and above all no lies between us. The night you collapsed because I forced you cruelly and with a desire for revenge to marry me, you told me first that your Step-mother, and then you changed it to your mother, had beaten you.”

  Lalitha’s eyes dropped before his and her fingers twisted each other together agitatedly.

  She did not speak and after a moment Lord Rothwyn said:

  “Let me make this quite clear: no-one shall ever hurt you again while you are under my protection. You are my wife and everything that you have suffered in the past is over!”

  She looked at him and he saw a sudden light come into her eyes, as if she believed what he had said.

  Then she said in a low voice:

  “But I cannot ... stay with ... you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you do not ... want me ... and if you ... send me ... away, no-one will ever know that you ... married me.”

  Lord Rothwyn’s eyes were on her face, and then he said in a rather strange voice:

  “Are you seriously suggesting, Lalitha, that you are prepared to hide away the fact that we are married? To vanish out of my life?”

  “It would be quite ... easy to ... do,” she answered, “and the only ... possible solution as far as ... you are ... concerned.” “Why should you think that?”

  “Because I am
... not the sort of ... wife you should ... have, and you did not... wish to ... marry me.” “I forced you to marry me,” he argued, “and we both know it was an act of revenge on your sister. At the same time it was a legal contract as well as a religious one. I married a ‘Miss Studley.’ ”

  Lalitha was still for a moment and then she asked: “Did I save . . . you from losing the . . . ten-thousand-guinea wager?”

  “You did,” he answered, “but I refused to take the money when it was offered to me.”

  “Why?”

  “I will tell you the truth,” Lord Rothwyn replied,

  “just as I hope I shall always hear the truth from you.” He sat back in the arm-chair at his ease and there was no harshness or enmity in his voice as he began: “When your sister said she would run away with me I took into my confidence two of my closest friends, one of whom told me I was a fool.” “W-why?” Lalitha asked.

  “He said that Sophie Studley was out to marry only for Social advancement, and that if she was prepared to jilt Julius Verton in my favour, it was merely because the Duke was likely to live for a long time, so I was a better bet.”

  Lalitha remembered Sophie saying very much the same thing and in the same words.

  “Because I imagined myself in love,” Lord Rothwyn went on, “I turned on him furiously for even suggesting such a thing ‘Sophie loves me for myself,’ I asserted, like any callow youth.”

  Just for a moment there was a hint of contempt in his voice before he continued:

  “ ‘Let us prove it,’ my friend suggested, ‘I will wager you ten thousand guineas that if she thought the Duke would die tomorrow, Miss Studley would hold to her engagement with Verton.’

  “I laughed him to scorn because I was so sure that Sophie’s protestations of love were real. To prove it we concocted between us a letter which we sent to your sister for her to receive before she set out to meet me in the Church-yard at St.

  Alphage.”

  “It was a cruel... test,” Lalitha murmured.

  “Cruel or not, it showed that I was indeed making a fool of myself and my friend was right.”

  “So he really won the wager!”

  “In actual fact he did,” Lord Rothwyn said, “but I remembered just as you were leaving me in the Churchyard that the actual wording of it had referred to ‘Miss Studley,’ not to ‘Miss Sophie Studley. ’ ”