Love and the Loathsome Leopard Read online

  He still wore his hat on the side of his head and his clothes told Lord Cheriton that he aped a gentleman, while his coarse features and thick fingers proclaimed all too clearly the stock he had come from.

  “So – you are still here!” he said abruptly to Lord Cheriton.

  “I don’t think I have had the pleasure of your acquaintance,” Lord Cheriton replied. “My name is Bradleigh – Stuart Bradleigh.”

  “So I have heard. You were a Captain in the Army.”

  “That is right”

  “Well, we’ve no work here and less accommodation for soldiers who’ve been demobilised and are now expecting their King and country to keep them in luxury.”

  There was no mistaking the offensive note in Jeffrey Farlow’s voice, but Lord Cheriton replied good humouredly,

  “I am, as it happens, quite capable of keeping myself. What I am looking for is somewhere to settle down.”

  “It’ll not be here!” Jeffrey Farlow said. “And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll leave first thing tomorrow morning.”

  “Indeed? And why should I do that?”

  “Because I tell you to and what I say round here goes!”

  There was a note in Jeffrey Farlow’s voice that told Lord Cheriton that actually he felt on the defensive and was struggling to assert his authority.

  Without being conceited, Lord Cheriton was aware that he had a strong, almost overwhelming presence, which he had developed as a leader of men and, because he had confidence in himself, he created a recognisable aura for those who were his inferiors.

  Sitting at his ease in the armchair, he was well aware that the man standing looking at him was feeling unaccountably uncomfortable and in consequence infuriated.

  “I was not aware that you owned this house,” Lord Cheriton said slowly.

  “That has nothing to do with it,” Jeffrey Farlow replied. “We don’t like strangers in Larkswell, and if they don’t obey what you would term their ‘marching orders,’ they soon find they are sorry!”

  Wivina made a little sound.

  “Please do not speak like that,” she pleaded. “Captain Bradleigh is a friend of Lord Cheriton’s, and you know how important it is that we should not be turned out of Larks Hall.”

  “It’s not important as far as I’m concerned,” Jeffrey Farlow answered, “and there’s another house waiting for you, as you well know.”

  Wivina made a little incoherent sound and looked away.

  “Perhaps this is a blessing in disguise,” Jeffrey Farlow went on. “Let this man take over this tumbledown ruin and you come to Farlow House as I have asked you to do often enough.”

  “And I have always refused,” Wivina said quickly.

  “You’re playing hard-to-get and who shall blame you?” he retorted. “But you’ll have to give in in the end.”

  Wivina shook her head, but he only smiled unpleasantly before saying:

  “I’ll make a bargain with you. Send this soldier packing and I’ll give you another week or so to think things over. If not, I’ll fetch you tomorrow evening, and, make no mistake, I mean what I say!”

  Slowly Lord Cheriton rose to his feet.

  He was considerably taller than Jeffrey Farlow and seemed to tower over him.

  “I wish you to give no ultimatums that concern me,” he said. “I am here as Miss Compton’s guest and if she wishes me to leave I will do so – tonight, if necessary.”

  “No, of course not!” Wivina said. “Captain Bradleigh is right, Mr. Farlow, you should not speak to him in such a manner, nor will I bargain with you.”

  Almost as if she was unaware of what she was doing and was simply guided by instinct, she took a step nearer to Lord Cheriton before she said,

  “I told you before that I will not marry you. In fact I would rather die than do so! You will not dictate my life for me nor interfere with whom I entertain or do not entertain. Please leave! I did not invite you here this evening!”

  For a moment there was no mistaking the fact that her words and her courage both surprised and in fact astounded Jeffrey Farlow.

  He stared as if he could not have heard aright, then he threw back his head and laughed.

  “Dutch courage!” he sneered. “Well, well! This is something you have been singularly lacking in before. I wonder what could have inspired it?”

  He looked at Lord Cheriton menacingly.

  Then he said,

  “We will talk about our marriage, Wivina, when your soldier friend has left. As you are well aware, I don’t take no for an answer. You’ll marry me – make no mistake – you’ll marry me!”

  He laughed again.

  Then, as if to emphasize his dramatic behaviour, he turned and walked from the salon, and they heard him laughing again as he crossed the hall.

  For a moment there was silence, then with a little cry that seemed to come from the very depths of her heart, Wivina cried,

  “Help me – please help me!” and turned towards Lord Cheriton.

  Without thought, almost as if it was inevitable, her face was hidden against his shoulder and his arms went round her.

  He could feel her trembling and realised how small, slight and fragile she was.

  “What can I do – what can I do?” she asked after a moment. “He will kill you unless you leave – so go – go tonight.”

  “And leave you alone?” Lord Cheriton asked in his deep voice.

  “You cannot help me – nobody can!” Wivina said. “I have known for a long time that he would force me by some means or another to – marry him, but I will not – do so – and–”

  She shuddered in a way which told Lord Cheriton exactly what she was thinking.

  “How long has this been going on?” he asked her.

  “A long time – and when we came here after Papa – died, he began to build a house, which he said was for me.”

  She gave a little sigh.

  “He wants to show off – for everyone to know how rich and important he is.”

  “And he thinks socially it will be to his advantage to have a wife like you.”

  “It is not only – that,” Wivina replied in a low voice, her face still hidden against his shoulder.

  ‘No, it is not only that,’ Lord Cheriton thought.

  He had seen the expression in Jeffrey Farlow’s dark eyes as he looked at Wivina and he realised that the man desired her not only as a man desires a woman but because she was everything that he was not. Her goodness was like a light which he would extinguish by his evil possession.

  “You must go away,” Lord Cheriton said aloud. “I will take you and Richard to London. You will be safe there.”

  For a moment he felt her body soften against him as if the idea thrilled her.

  Then she said,

  “Do you imagine that he would let us leave? He has spies everywhere! They are all too frightened of him in the village not to tell him every single thing that goes on.”

  She was tense as she continued,

  “The moment we walk out through the front door someone would inform him and we would be apprehended before we reached the main highway. You would be killed and I would be taken to Farlow House – and there would be – no escape.”

  Lord Cheriton, listening, knew that, if he told such a story to the Prime Minister or even to the Surveyor General of Customs, they would find it hard to believe.

  But, having met Jeffrey Farlow, having studied the reports of the gangs’ terrorism on the local people, he knew that Wivina spoke the truth.

  “We will think of something,” he said quietly. “In the meantime we must play for time and I must pretend to do what he says and leave here tomorrow morning.”

  “You will – leave?”

  It was a cry that seemed to come from Wivina’s heart.

  “I shall only pretend to do so,” Lord Cheriton replied, “but I promise you I will find a way of taking you to safety.”

  She looked up at him as if she could not believe what she had h
eard.

  He looked down into her eyes.

  “You have to trust me.”

  “I want to,” she answered. “I want to – but I am – afraid.”

  “I can understand that,” Lord Cheriton replied, “but I promise you we will find a way out, a way to get both you and Richard to safety. You believe me?”

  “I want to believe – you,” she murmured.

  Lord Cheriton looked down at her and his lips were very near to hers.

  As if she was suddenly as conscious of it as he was, he felt her draw in her breath and yet her body did not stiffen in his arms.

  Instead it was almost as if she drew nearer to him, then his lips were on hers.

  He had not meant to kiss her, it had not really crossed his mind that he might do so until that moment.

  Then, as he felt the softness and the innocence of her mouth beneath his, as he felt a little tremor go through her, he knew that this was what he had wanted since the first moment he had seen her haloed by the sunshine.

  It was a kiss that he realised was different from any other kiss he had ever known.

  It was an enchantment that seemed to be part of her beauty and her grace. It was something intangible, which awoke feelings within Lord Cheriton that he had never known before.

  His life had been one of action and harsh reality.

  Yet somewhere in the make-up of the man, who commanded respect, but not affection, there lingered – a secret hidden even from himself – the idealism of the boy who had run away from everything that was cruel and degrading to fund a new life of his own.

  As he held Wivina close to him and his lips became more demanding, more insistent, he thought that what he felt for her was part of the beauty and love that he had known with his mother, and that which he had found in the silver of the lake and the dark mystery of the woods.

  It was their beauty that had brought to him the only solace he had known from the tyranny and cruelty of his father and it was the memory of these things that had filled his dreams in the heat of India, the cold and dirt of Portugal, and the filth and stench of the battlefields of Spain.

  It seemed now as if while he kissed her, Wivina embodied everything that had moved and inspired him and lifted him sometimes only in his dreams towards the heights within himself.

  And he knew that what he felt, she felt too, and as she quivered against him, not with fear but with the wonder of the emotions he evoked in her, he knew that together they touched the divine.

  What they felt was not of the world, but something so perfect, so rapturous, that it was hard for their human minds to grasp the wonder of it.

  How long their kiss lasted neither Lord Cheriton nor Wivina had any idea, but when finally he raised his head he saw by the light of the candles that her face was transfigured and she was more beautiful than any woman he had ever seen before.

  She looked up at him, her eyes alight with a glory that did not come from the candles but from within herself.

  Then she asked almost beneath her breath,

  “Is – this love?”

  “It is love!” Lord Cheriton said firmly. “The love I have been seeking all my life, although I did not know it!”

  “How could it – happen so quickly?”

  He smiled.

  “In the East they would say we have been moving towards each other all through the centuries. It is our Karma that we should belong to each other.”

  “Do I – belong to you?”

  “Can you doubt it?”

  “No,” she answered. “It is too wonderful – too perfect for doubt.”

  She paused, then she said with a little note of anxiety in her voice:

  “Do you – feel as – I do?”

  It was the question of a child who wants to be reassured.

  “I feel as you do, and very much more,” Lord Cheriton replied. “You belong to me, Wivina, you have always belonged to me and now we have found each other.”

  She made a little incoherent murmur of sheer happiness and hid her face against his shoulder.

  Masterfully he put his fingers under her chin and turned her face up to his.

  “I want to look at you,” he said. “I did not know that anyone could be so beautiful.”

  Her eyelashes fluttered shyly, then were dark against her cheeks.

  Because he could not help himself, Lord Cheriton’s arms tightened and he was kissing her again, kissing her passionately, demandingly, feeling a wild elation as her lips responded to his and her body seemed to melt against him.

  After a long time he said, and his voice was curiously unsteady,

  “I love you! Oh, my precious darling, I love you! How could I have dreamt that this could ever happen to me?”

  “You have not – been in love before?” Wivina questioned in a whisper.

  Lord Cheriton shook his head.

  “Never like this. And what I have felt I have never pretended was love, only something very different.”

  “I have dreamt that someday I might meet someone like you,” Wivina sighed.

  Then she gave a little cry.

  “Suppose it’s too late? Supposing we cannot escape?”

  “It is not too late and we will escape!” Lord Cheriton said firmly. “But, as I have already told you, you have to trust me.”

  “You know I do that. You know I trust you completely and absolutely.”

  There was a little pause and then she added,

  “I love – you!”

  “That is what I want you to say and go on saying so that I am quite sure you are not mistaken.”

  “I am not mistaken, and love is more wonderful – more – glorious than I ever imagined.”

  “We will find love together,” Lord Cheriton said, “but first we have to find safety. I must get you out of this mess.”

  As if his words recalled the horror of which she was so conscious, he felt Wivina tremble again as she hid her face against his shoulder.

  “Supposing,” she said in a voice so inaudible that he could hardly hear it, “he – hurts or – kills you?”

  “You are not to worry,” Lord Cheriton replied. “You have promised that you will trust me. Remember, Wivina, that I am not only a soldier but also a leopard, and the leopards defeated the eagles.”

  She looked up at him and he thought she was even more beautiful than she had been a moment before.

  “My – leopard, whom I – love!” she said very softly.

  He kissed her again, then he said with his arms still round her,

  “I want you to tell me something, darling. Do you think there will be another cargo coming in tonight?”

  Just for a moment her eyes widened with fear, then she answered with a calmness that he admired,

  “I think so. That is why Mr. Farlow hurried away.”

  “I thought that,” Lord Cheriton said. “There must have been one on Sunday night, because he brought you presents on Monday.”

  He was talking to himself and he realised that Wivina was surprised because she had not known that he had overheard.

  “Yes – there was one on Sunday night,” she answered, “and so, as today is Tuesday and the weather is so perfect, I imagine they left early this morning. If not, it will be tomorrow.”

  Lord Cheriton thought for a moment.

  “I want you to go to bed, my darling one, and try to forget everything except our love. Tomorrow I shall make plans, and perhaps I shall make a pretence of leaving. I am not certain at the moment.”

  “What do you intend to do tonight?” Wivina asked anxiously.

  Lord Cheriton kissed her forehead.

  “I am not going to tell you and I don’t wish you to worry about it.”

  “If you spy on them – if you go anywhere near them and they catch you – they will – kill you!”

  She paused for a moment and then she went on,

  “There was a – boy in the village who they thought was an informer – but he was only simpleminded and talked about thi
ngs he did not understand. They tortured him and when he was found dead, he had both his eyes – gouged out!”

  There was so much horror in her voice that Lord Cheriton pulled her close against him, then he said,

  “Forget all about it! You are not to think of them or of anything they do! Think only of what we mean to each other. Think of the future when we can be together.”

  “I am – afraid for you”

  “I understand that and love you for it, but, my precious, I am an old soldier and therefore there is no need for you to be afraid for me.”

  “I will try to do as you ask.”

  There was something so sweet in the way she spoke the words that Lord Cheriton was kissing her again, kissing her until the room seemed to swim round and everything disappeared but the wonder of their love, which was like a blazing light shining in the darkness.

  Lord Cheriton was conscious that his heart was beating violently and so was hers.

  When finally he took his arms from around her, they looked at each other, the breath coming quickly from between their lips, and they could see nothing but the glory of their love and their need for each other.

  “Go to bed, my perfect little love,” Lord Cheriton said. “Dream of me as I shall be thinking of you every moment, every second, we are not together.”

  “I want to – stay with you,” Wivina said in a low voice.

  “Very soon we shall be together,” Lord Cheriton promised, “all day and all night, but for the moment, my darling, we are in the middle of a battle.”

  He smiled as he spoke, but Wivina shivered.

  Then, as if she wished to obey him, to do what he wanted, she went round the room blowing out all the candles except for one that she carried in her hand as she led the way towards the door.

  Lord Cheriton escorted her up the staircase.

  When he reached the door of the room which had been his mother’s, he looked down at her in the candlelight and saw the love and trust in her eyes.

  “I worship you!” he said very quietly.

  Then he kissed her gently as a man might kiss a child, and opening the door of her room, he put her inside and closed it behind her.

  As he walked towards his own room, he could hardly believe that this had happened to him.