The Marquis Who Hated Women (Bantam Series No. 62) Read online

  She knew he was speaking jokingly. At the same time, as he shut the cabin door behind him she thought that what he said was very true.

  She had tried to keep her promise and disturb no-one even while she had been so frightened that she wanted to scream.

  But her good resolutions had been swept aside, and she had in fact been a considerable nuisance, clinging to him and having to be fed after his dinner had been served.

  She could not help feeling that after this he would undoubtedly put her ashore at Gibraltar and not take her on to Algiers, which was what she had hoped.

  “It will be my own fault,” she said. “I cannot think why I am so ... foolish.”

  The ship was rolling violently but she did not feel as afraid as she had before. She also felt very sleepy and as her eyes closed she was not quite certain where her thoughts ended and her dreams began.

  “I gave the young lady something to make her sleep,” Hignet was saying to the Marquis as he helped him undress.

  “That was sensible,” the Marquis replied. “Did you put it in the champagne?”

  “Yes, M’Lord. She never noticed it. Few ladies have your palate, M’Lord. I’d never get away with slipping anything unbeknown to Your Lordship.”

  “Do not let Miss Bartlett hear you,” the Marquis said. “She is continually telling me that women are as good as men in almost every particular, except, it appears, in being afraid in a storm.”

  “There’s a good many men as doesn’t like it either,” Hignet said.

  “That I can believe,” the Marquis agreed. “At the same time, it is natural for a woman to feel afraid, whether of a storm or of a mouse.”

  “Of course it is, M’Lord,” Hignet answered.

  When the Marquis was alone he found himself thinking of how convulsively Shikara had trembled in his arms and how slight and light her body was.

  He was used to voluptuous, big-breasted women, like Inez Shangarry, and he could not remember when he had last held close anyone as slender as Shikara.

  “She is very young, he told himself. “She will get over these ridiculous notions about men and find a husband who will look after her.”

  He wondered what sort of man would finally attract her.

  “He would have to be intelligent,” the Marquis told himself.

  He thought of their conversations and the extent to which Shikara not only had clearly absorbed the beauty of the places she had visited but also had shown knowledge of the customs and traditions of different nations, which surprised him.

  He had always been interested in the history of different countries but seldom had found anyone who shared his interests to any great extent; which was why he preferred to travel alone with Hignet

  He found himself remembering now that he had always intended some day to visit Egypt.

  The history of the Pharaohs had fascinated him and he had followed with great interest the discoveries that had been made recently amongst the Pyramids.

  “I would like to see the Sphinx,” he told himself.

  Then he thought he had no intention of pandering to Shikara by taking her up the Nile in his yacht.

  ‘I will go first to Algiers,’ he thought. ‘Then only if it suits me, I might visit Cairo before I return to England.’

  The storm was dying away when the Marquis awoke after having slept well and deeply without having been disturbed.

  The Sea Horse was still rolling, but the violence of the waves was not to be compared with that of the day before, and when the Marquis went to the bridge the Captain was in good spirits.

  "You were right, M’Lord,” he said. “The Sea Horse is remarkably sea-worthy, and after such a baptism of fire we need never be worried about her again.”

  “You were worried?” the Marquis asked in surprise.

  The Captain looked a trifle embarrassed.

  “A new vessel is always a matter for concern, M’Lord, and I have seldom known a worse storm in the Bay, although I have been through it dozens of times.”

  “You really believed we were in danger?” the Marquis asked.

  “I am not ashamed to confess now,” the Captain replied, “that I had a few anxious moments.”

  “It never crossed my mind,” the Marquis said truthfully. “You surprise me, Captain!”

  “If it would suit Your Lordship I would like if possible to put in to Lisbon,” the Captain said. “There are one or two things which should be repaired and the stewards report that quite a lot of crockery has been broken.”

  “Then we will stop at Lisbon,” the Marquis decided.

  “Thank you, M’Lord.”

  The Marquis went down to luncheon to find Shikara already in the Saloon.

  She was neatly dressed, but her face was very pale although her eyes lit up when he appeared.

  “You are better?” he asked.

  “I am perfectly all right,” she answered, “and very ashamed of myself.”

  “There is not the least necessity to apologise.”

  “I am humiliated that I had not enough willpower to prevent myself from being so stupid.”

  She saw the Marquis smile and said accusingly: “Of course, you are delighted! You have proved your point and I am a weak, clinging little woman! What could be more satisfactory from a man’s point of view?”

  “Shall I say I will not hold it against you?” the Marquis suggested. “We will fight our battles without reference to what occurred last night.”

  “I suppose you think you are being generous,” Shikara said bitterly.

  “It is certainly not being accepted in any spirit of generosity,” the Marquis retorted.

  They sparred with each other over luncheon in the manner to which they had now become accustomed and only when the meal was ended and Shikara would have withdrawn the Marquis said:

  “I suggest you stay here in the Saloon this afternoon. You will not disturb me as I am going on the bridge. I dare say after twenty-four hours in your own cabin you are heartily sick of it.”

  Shikara looked at him a little uncertainly and he added:

  “The invitation has no strings! I am not cosseting you or treating you like a weak creature who has no will of her own.”

  “Very well, I will stay,” Shikara said almost defiantly, “but if you find me an encumbrance you have only to say so.”

  ‘I assure you I would not hesitate to do so,” the Marquis replied.

  He left her alone and when he returned two hours later it was to find that she was asleep, stretched out on one of the sofas, her fair hair against a silk cushion.

  She looked very young and very fragile and the Marquis sitting down in an adjacent chair looked at her.

  What she had been through yesterday had, he knew, been exhausting. There was nothing so unnerving as fear. At the same time, he thought she had a courage that he had not expected to find in a woman, especially in one so young.

  ‘She will get to Cairo and find her father by hook or by crook,’ he thought to himself, ‘and in defiance of anyone who might try to stop her. She is certainly brave even if she is fool-hardy.’

  He picked up a book that he was reading but found it difficult to follow the pages.

  His eyes kept wandering towards Shikara and he thought she was in fact very lovely, with a beauty which, when she was not talking or being defiant, had something spiritual about it.

  Perhaps it was in the delicacy of her features or in the shape of her face.

  He admired her winged eye-brows on either side of a small, straight nose, and he wondered who her mother had been, feeling that such features and her high-instepped little feet could only have come through some aristocratic lineage.

  He also wondered what his friends would say if they knew where he was at the moment and with whom.

  He could imagine the jokes that would pass round the Club and the remarks which would be made—remarks which he was well aware were always made about him when it was known in whom he was interested.

  But it w
as not the Marquis’s fault that his amours were so freely discussed.

  It was nearly always the woman concerned who flaunted him in the face of her rivals who had been pursuing the Marquis fruitlessly for a long time.

  In fact, the Marquis had often been extremely annoyed to discover that people were talking about him long before there were any grounds for it.

  ‘At least,’ he thought with satisfaction, no-one knows that Shikara is here.’

  Once again his thoughts went to Inez Shangarry, and he guessed what she and her husband had said when they found their bird had flown.

  He found that both his anger and his sense of humiliation where they were concerned had modified in the last few days.

  In a way it was understandable that those who “had not” should wish to take from those who “had” and who was more fortunate than himself in having such an abundance of worldly goods?

  He was, however, well aware that it was not only his money which tempted women into indiscretions and into throwing their hearts at his feet.

  It was also because he had a certain attraction for them, which he had known ever since he grew to manhood.

  “Do you love me?” “Will you love me forever?” “Oh, Osborne, give me your heart.”

  How often had he heard these phrases repeated again and again, and he could hear, almost as if he were speaking them now, his glib responses, the manner in which he avoided lying while at the same time being reassuring and comforting.

  He knew that if he was truthful he had never actually been in love; never had there been any woman to whom he said: “I love you!” with any degree of truth.

  “I must be unusual—or perhaps just honest,” the Marquis told himself.

  At the same time, he was well aware that if he confessed such sentiments to any of his contemporaries they would not believe him.

  He remembered the boys with whom he had been at Eton, who had always been frantically in love in their last few terms, usually with an actress or some extremely unsuitable female.

  At Oxford it had been exactly the same: half the undergraduates in his year had spent their time not working but pursuing the local girls or members of the Chorus in the plays that appeared at the theatre.

  One of his contemporaries at Eton, the Marquis recalled, had been ecstatically and lyrically in love with the wife of one of the Masters.

  He would write poems to her and extolled her virtues for hours on end.

  “Why have I never been like that?” he asked.

  Then he told himself he had no desire to become maudlin over any woman.

  Women were there to amuse and entertain. When they ceased to do either, then there was always another woman to take their place.

  And what interested a woman except a man? That was exactly how it should be and why the sexes had been created for each other.

  Then again he looked at Shikara and thought how extraordinary it was that she should hate men.

  “She has been unfortunate in those she has met,” the Marquis told himself.

  He thought of Lord Stroud and shuddered. He could not imagine that pompous bore kissing and making love to anything so lovely and sensitive as Shikara.

  “No wonder she ran away,” he said beneath his breath.

  As if his thoughts of her aroused her from her sleep, Shikara opened her eyes, saw him sitting on the chair, and smiled sleepily.

  “I was ... dreaming of ... you,” she said drowsily.

  “I am flattered,” the Marquis said. “I should have imagined that you would not have allowed a man to intrude into anything so intimate as your dreams.”

  “We were ... riding over the desert ... I think it was on horses ... but it might have been camels.”

  “If I have a choice I should prefer a horse,” the Marquis said vehemently. “If there is one movement I really dislike it is that of a camel!”

  Shikara laughed and woke up completely.

  She sat up on the sofa and instinctively her hand went to her hair.

  “Am I being a ... nuisance?” she asked. “Shall I retire?”

  “I am delighted for you to stay,” the Marquis answered. “And have you noticed anything?”

  She looked round curiously. Then he said: “Already the sea is subsiding and is very much smoother that it was.”

  “Yes, of course,” Shikara said. “How wonderful!” She put her legs to the ground. Then she looked at the Marquis and said in a low voice:

  “You were very kind last night I did not think a ... man could be ... like that.”

  “Like what?” the Marquis asked.

  “Considerate and ... understanding.”

  “I have come to the conclusion that you have known some very strange types of men,” the Marquis said, “just as you think I have known some very odd types of women.”

  Shikara laughed.

  “I can guess what your women have been like,” she said. “Brilliant, glittering, and very beautiful. My men have all been incredibly immature and boring, or else old and pompous.”

  “As I have just said, you have been unfortunate,” the Marquis told her. “One day you will meet a man who is different, and then I do not mind betting, Shikara, that you will fall in love.”

  She looked at him and for a moment their eyes seemed to be held by each other’s. Then almost abruptly the Marquis reached out and pulled the bell.

  “I suggest that as we are both here together we have English tea—why not?” he asked. “And I am interested to see if my Chef can bake a good cake.”

  * * *

  They came into Port Tejo about midday and Shikara watching the yacht moving up the estuary of the Tagus exclaimed at the beauty of the capital of Portugal.

  Built on the slopes of a range of small hills above the river s estuary, Lisbon was, the Marquis knew, one of the most spectacular cities in Europe.

  “I have always thought,” he said as he stood beside Shikara, “that Lisbon rivals Naples and Istanbul in its views and its magnificent setting.”

  It was certainly very different from most capitals. Round its tiled and multi-coloured buildings was a belt of vines, parks, and woods.

  Shikara had already questioned the Marquis about the city and he had told her that the oldest part was Alfama, the eastern district, where narrow, winding streets crowded down to the river between a jungle of trees.

  “The central district—Baixa,” he went on, “was built in 1755 after an earthquake which laid the place flat. You will find there the streets are broad and there are some excellent shops which I have a feeling you are looking forward to visiting.”

  Shikara looked at him and asked:

  “How can you be so intuitive?”

  “Considering the smallness of your valise, I am convinced that you are longing for new clothes.”

  “Of course I am,” Shikara agreed.

  It had not escaped the Marquis’s notice how skilfully she managed with the few gowns she had with her.

  Being experienced where women were concerned, he realised that the same white evening-gown had a number of sashes of different colours and coloured wreaths with which Shikara rang the changes at dinner.

  It was too cold for her to wear anything on deck in the daytime except her travelling-suit and the magnificent cloak that he had provided for her from his sister’s wardrobe.

  But the blouse under her jacket was interchanged with one of a different colour and she had various chiffon scarves which were either draped round her neck or tied in a soft bow under her small chin.

  Shikara gave a little sigh.

  “I would love some new clothes,” she said, “but I do not think it would be wise to spend very much money on them. After all, as you have pointed out to me already, when I have sold all Mama’s jewellery I shall have to find employment.”

  “You told me that would be quite easy.”

  “I am sure it will be,” Shikara said quickly, “but as I am merely a woman I shall doubtless be unfairly and sparingly paid!”
>
  The Marquis laughed.

  “Very well,” he said, ‘I will be your banker and give you a loan, to be repaid when you come into your fortune, or if in the meantime you marry a millionaire.”

  “I will certainly not marry a millionaire!” Shikara said, “but...”

  She paused.

  “Well, what is it?” the Marquis asked.

  “Mama always said that no lady would take money from a gentleman.”

  “You have pointed out to me often enough that women should be on equal terms with men,” the Marquis replied. “If you were a man-friend I would not hesitate to offer you a loan if you needed it, and I am quite certain in the circumstances you would accept it with alacrity.”

  “If you are quite ... sure it is ... all right,” Shikara said doubtfully.

  “What do you mean—all right?” the Marquis challenged. “Are you expecting me to dun you for it, or worse still expect some other sort of repayment?”

  He spoke without thinking and Shikara looked at him in a puzzled way.

  “What could that be?” she asked.

  The Marquis realised how innocent the question was and quickly said:

  ‘I might make you work for me. The Chef is already complaining that he wants someone to help with the washing up.”

  Shikara laughed.

  “I would not mind doing that if he taught me to cook as well as he does!”

  “You must tell him so,” the Marquis said, “he will be flattered.”

  After some lengthy discussion on how much money she would need they finally went ashore to shop in the broad streets of Baixa, Shikara having twenty-five pounds in her purse.

  “You will have to change it into local currency,” the Marquis warned, “in which case it will doubtless seem a great deal more.”

  “What I will need in Egypt,” Shikara said reflectively, “will be plenty of thin gowns.”

  “Yes, of course,” the Marquis agreed, “and do not forget to buy a sun-shade and provide yourself with a topee. You do not wish to have sun-stroke.”

  “I have been in far hotter countries than Egypt.”

  “I apologise if my advice is ill-advised.”