This is Love Page 7

  “It itched – and – itched,” Peter said. “I wanted to – scratch it but I – could not – reach.”

  As he spoke, Athina heard Mrs. Field saying to the Marquis,

  “Never in all me born years, my Lord, have I seen anythin’ so wicked and horrible as the way this poor little boy’s been treated. It be enough to make her Ladyship turn in her grave!”

  The Marquis had moved round so that he could see Peter’s back where the light from the window shone on it.

  If anything it looked worse than it had last night and during the long drive several of the weals had bled and had stuck to his shirt.

  The skin surrounding them was red and swollen.

  He could also see what Athina had seen that there were old scars still on his back from previous beatings.

  “You will – not leave me – will – you?” Peter was asking her desperately.

  He was almost in tears and speaking in a whisper, but the Marquis heard.

  “I promise you I will not,” Athina assured him, “but you must let this kind lady put some cream on your back, which I should have done this morning. It was stupid of me not to, but I was in such a hurry to get away.”

  “We escaped – from Step-Papa,” Peter murmured.

  “Yes, we escaped,” Athina agreed.

  “And you don’t – think – Step-Papa will find – me here?”

  There was a note of terror in Peter’s voice.

  Athina looked up at the Marquis who was standing behind him.

  “I can answer that question,” the Marquis asserted, “and I promise you that your stepfather will never beat you again.”

  There was a hard note in his voice. If there was one thing that the Marquis loathed above everything else it was cruelty.

  He had once knocked a man down on the Racecourse for beating a horse that had not won a race that he had been expected to win.

  And he had been challenged by a member of White’s Club to a duel because he had accused him of ill-treating one of his carriage horses.

  The Marquis saw Athina’s eyes light up as if the sunshine was bursting through the gloom.

  It suddenly struck him that kneeling on the floor with Peter’s arms around her, she looked very lovely.

  With her head close to Peter’s she might have stepped down from a picture painted by a great Master of the Madonna and Child.

  After he had spoken, Peter loosened his tight hold on Athina and he turned his face round to look at the Marquis.

  “This is your uncle,” Athina then told him. “He knows that we ran away and I have brought you here for his protection.”

  She looked at the Marquis quizzically as she spoke.

  The Marquis held out his hand.

  “I am delighted to meet you, Peter and I think it was very clever of you to run away with Lady Athina. Now I have to talk to her about what we are going to do in the future.”

  “I will – not have – to go – back to Step-Papa – will I?” Peter asked in a quavering voice.

  “I promise you that you will not have to,” the Marquis replied.

  He looked at Mrs. Field.

  “Now suppose you work your magic on Master Peter’s back,” he said, “while I take her Ladyship downstairs to have some breakfast.”

  “I’ll do that, my Lord,” Mrs. Field said. “I’ve already promised the young gentleman that he’ll feel quite different when I’ve put some honey on his wound.”

  “Honey!” Athina exclaimed. “Will that take away the pain?”

  “He’ll have no pain and these terrible scars will heal in two days,” Mrs. Field assured her.

  “I have never heard of anybody using honey before”.

  “My Ma were known as ‘the white witch’,” Mrs. Field answered, “and people come from far and wide to get the herbal remedies she made for ’em. But she always said that when it come to healin’ cuts there’s nothin’ like honeys and I always uses it meself.”

  “What do you think of that, Peter?” the Marquis exclaimed. “You have a white witch looking after you. And who could ask for more?”

  Peter looked at Mrs. Field wide-eyed.

  “Do you fly on a broomstick?” he then asked her.

  “I wishes I could,” she replied. “That’s what they used to say me Ma did and that’s what you’ll want to do when your back’s healed. So come on and let me put some honey on it.”

  Athina rose to her feet.

  “Stay with Mrs. Field until she has finished,” she advised him, “and I will be downstairs waiting for you.”

  Peter put out his hand to touch her.

  “You – promise? You will not go – away without – me?”

  “I promise,” Athina said after another glance at the Marquis.

  She picked up her hat which she had put down on a chair.

  Then she said to Mrs. Field,

  “Thank you, thank you very much. I am very grateful for all your help with poor Peter.”

  She saw that Mrs. Field was about to put what looked like thick clover honey on strips of linen and they would cover Peter’s injuries and held in place by a bandage.

  The Marquis opened the door and they then walked out into the corridor.

  She thought that he would say something to her, but they went on in silence down the stairs and into the breakfast room.

  Dawson must have anticipated that this was what they would do and he was just placing a silver coffee pot on a tray at the top of the table.

  “You say you left at five o’clock,” the Marquis said. “You must be really starving by now.”

  “I admit to feeling a trifle hungry,” Athina replied, “but usually one becomes thirsty when driving because of the dust.”

  She remembered as she was speaking how Peter had said that his stepfather would not let him stop for a drink of water yesterday.

  She felt that there was no point in giving further instances to the Marquis of the cruelty that the child had suffered. It was enough that the Marquis had seen his back.

  He walked over to the sideboard and lifted the lids of some of the entrée dishes.

  “Will you have eggs or fish or both?” he asked her.

  Athina gave a little laugh.

  “I think a little of both would be very nice, my Lord.”

  She sat down at the table and he brought two plates to her.

  Then he poured out some coffee into a cup for her and another for himself saying as he did so,

  “There is no need for me to admit in words that I was wrong and that you were absolutely right.”

  “I thought you would agree with me when you saw for yourself what has been happening to Peter,” Athina said. “I suppose it would have been more sensible to let you see him first.”

  She thought that they were each conceding something to the other.

  Her common sense told her that, if she was to fight for Peter, it was essential to have the Marquis on her side.

  He was obviously thinking and she remained silent until he said,

  “Do you think Burnham will follow you?”

  “I was thinking on the way here that he would,” Athina answered, “once he realised that there was a communicating door between my room and Peter’s. He had locked Peter’s outside door so he would know that Peter must have left with me.”

  She paused for a moment before she added,

  “He will learn that I left very early in the morning, but he will not know who I am.”

  “Why is that?” the Marquis asked.

  “Because I gave the proprietor the name of my chaperone, Mrs. Beckwith,” Athina explained.

  She hesitated for a moment before she went on,

  “But my groom was in my father’s livery and there were other grooms there who might have recognised it.”

  The Marquis nodded.

  “I should think it would be more than likely. Burnham, who has, of course, often stayed here at Rock Park might well be aware that our estates march with each other.”

>   Athina stiffened.

  “In which case he will go straight to Murling Park. What shall I – do? What shall I – say if he – comes?”

  She suddenly felt rather helpless.

  Her servants were old and she remembered how aggressive and loud-voiced Lord Burnham had been.

  She felt sure that she and Mrs. Beckwith would not be able to cope with him.

  She was suddenly frightened.

  So frightened that she forgot for a moment or two her dislike of the Marquis and said pleadingly,

  “I promised Peter that he would not have to go – back with Lord Burnham and also that I would not – leave him. Tell me what I should do – please – tell me.”

  “Peter will stay here,” the Marquis said firmly, “and I will cope with Burnham. At the same time, as I am an unmarried man, there is every possibility that he will assert I am not a suitable person to be in charge of a child.”

  As he spoke the word ‘unmarried’, the Marquis had an idea.

  For the moment it seemed so inconceivable that he could hardly formulate it to himself.

  Then, as he tried to do so, the door opened and Peter came in. He was not wearing a coat, but he had on a clean white shirt.

  Athina guessed that Mrs. Field had found a shirt that had once belonged to the Marquis when he was a small boy.

  Peter walked towards her saying,

  “My back – feels better – much – much better – already.”

  He went to stand beside Athina’s chair and looked at what was on her plate.

  “The butler told me that you ate very little at breakfast,” Athina said, “and now that you are feeling better, perhaps you would like some more?”

  “Can I have some more?” Peter asked. “Step-Papa never allowed me to have a second helping and, when he says I have been naughty, I have no food for a whole day.”

  “That must make you feel very hungry,” Athina remarked.

  “I have a big hole in my tummy,” Peter replied, “and sometimes I feel so weak it’s difficult to get out of bed.”

  Athina looked at the Marquis.

  Although it seemed strange, she realised that she could read his thoughts.

  They were both thinking the same thing and it was so incredible that she almost dismissed it as pure imagination.

  She just knew, however, beyond any doubt that the same idea had occurred to Peter’s uncle.

  “Well, Peter, now that you are here with me,” the Marquis said aloud, “you are to eat big meals every day, otherwise you will not be strong enough to ride my horses.”

  “Ride your horses?” Peter repeated. “Can I really?”

  “Of course you can, Peter,” the Marquis promised. “Your father was a very good rider and I expect you are too.”

  He rose from the table as he spoke and lifted the lids of the entrée dishes in the same way that he had for Athina and this time he lifted more of them.

  “Now you have to eat all this,” he said to Peter, “and, if this is not enough, we will tell the chef to make you some more.”

  Peter laughed.

  “If I eat all that I will get so fat that I will be ‒ too heavy for your horses to carry me!”

  “We will risk it,” the Marquis replied, “and, if my horses cannot manage you, we will try the ones that draw the carts.”

  Peter laughed as if it was a huge joke.

  Athina thought that the Marquis at least was clever in gaining the confidence of the small boy.

  He piled Peter’s plate with food and poured him out some milk and then he sat down again at the head of the table.

  As he did so, Athina suggested,

  “As I have finished, my Lord, I would like to have another word with you about where we should go now and what we should do.”

  “Yes, of course,” the Marquis agreed.

  Peter looked up from the other end of the table as Athina rose to her feet.

  “You are – not leaving – me?” he asked in a nervous voice.

  “I am just going back to the study with your uncle. I am sure that Dawson will come and tell you more about what your mother enjoyed when she was a little girl.”

  The Marquis had already rung the bell while Athina was speaking,

  “Master Peter is very hungry, Dawson,” he said. “I have told him he is to eat everything he can so that he will be strong enough to ride the biggest of my horses.”

  “I be sure he’ll soon be riding, my Lord.”

  “Now see that he has everything he wants,” the Marquis went on, “and, when he has finished, you can bring him to the study.”

  “Very good, my Lord, and I’ll look after Master Peter,” Dawson replied.

  Athina just stopped long enough to smooth Peter’s hair back and drop a kiss on his forehead.

  “There is no hurry,” she told him softly. “You are going to stay here and anyway I do not think that your stepfather will find us for a long time.”

  As she spoke, she felt Peter’s relief as he let out a deep sigh and it seemed to seep through his small body.

  She knew only too well that the child was terrified of being beaten again.

  As she and the Marquis went into the study, he closed the door behind them before he began,

  “I have a proposition to put to you, Lady Athina. And I only hope that it will not make you angry again.”

  “I am not angry now that I know you realise how much Peter has suffered and that it cannot go on,” Athina replied quietly.

  She was silent for a few moments and then she said in a very low voice,

  “I-I knew what you were – thinking just now – and I was thinking the same thing – that his stepfather is trying to – kill him!”

  “It did pass through my mind,” the Marquis admitted. “But how could any man in his position even think of such a dreadful thing as murdering a little boy?”

  “You can see how thin Peter is,” Athina insisted, “and the terrible injuries that have been inflicted on his back. Not only is he terrified, but he has also been deprived of food and drink – ”

  “I realise that now,” the Marquis interrupted, “and it makes me so angry that it would give me the greatest pleasure to give my brother-in-law a taste of his own medicine.”

  He spoke savagely and then in a different tone he stated,

  “At the same time he is a much older man than I am and it would be a great mistake, whatever else we might do, to create any kind of a scandal.”

  “Are you afraid that a scandal would damage your reputation?” Athina asked him somewhat sarcastically.

  “I was not actually thinking of myself,” the Marquis answered, “but of my family. As you can imagine, if it becomes known what has been happening to the boy, there will be such an uproar and as his Guardian Burnham will make things more unpleasant for us than we could for him.”

  “I understand what you are saying,” Athina replied, “but I am thinking only of Peter.”

  “I do have a solution to this problem and that is what I want to explain to you,” the Marquis proposed.

  “I am listening,” Athina responded.

  Next she sat down in the same place on the sofa where she had sat before with both hands in her lap.

  The Marquis walked over to the fireplace and stood with his back to it

  Then he said,

  “If you think you have a problem, Lady Athina, so have I. What I am going to tell you is strictly confidential and I feel sure that you will not repeat it to anybody else.”

  Athina nodded and he went on,

  “I was informed only yesterday by the Lord Chamberlain that Her Majesty the Queen will appoint me her Master of the Horse on the one condition that I am married or engaged to be.”

  Athina stared at him.

  “But, as have I told you, I have always understood that it was a tradition that the Head of your Family should hold such a position. At least that is what my father told me some years ago.”

  “That is true,” the Marquis
agreed, “but the decision as to who occupies the post is, of course, for Her Majesty to make.”

  Athina wondered how this could concern Peter and then she asked him,

  “What are you going to do about it, my Lord?”

  “I was thinking that it might be dangerous for you to take Peter to your home, as I think you intend,” the Marquis said. “He can stay here. but I think my brother-in-law will protest.”

  He paused a moment and then continued,

  “As I am much younger than he is and, of course, unmarried, he could readily claim that he is a far more suitable Guardian for the boy than I am.”

  As if Athina at that moment had become suddenly aware of where the conversation was leading, she stiffened.

  “What I am suggesting,” the Marquis went on, “is that for Peter’s sake and mine you agree to an engagement between us which – ”

  “No! No! Of course not!” Athina interrupted him. “I vowed a long time ago that I would never marry anyone unless I was in love with him! I can only say, my Lord – and I don’t wish to be rude – that I would not marry you under any circumstances!”

  “I have no wish to be married myself,” the Marquis said, “and, if you had allowed me, Lady Athina, to finish my sentence, I was going to say that it would be ‘an engagement’ that we privately agree can be terminated at any time that suits either of us.”

  Athina stared at him.

  Then she queried,

  “Do you mean – it will just be a – pretence?”

  “Of course that is exactly what I mean for, if you have no wish to be married, no more do I.”

  He looked at her a moment and then went on,

  “However, to announce our engagement could make me Master of the Horse and at the same time enable you to stay here with, of course, your chaperone, until such time as Lord Burnham accepts that he is no longer Peter’s Guardian.”

  Athina pressed her hands together.

  Now she understood just what the Marquis was putting forward.

  She could see that from Peter’s point of view it was the only way that he could be safe and she could be with him to protect him.

  As it also solved the Marquis’s problem, there was no reason for her to be afraid that she would become too involved with him.

  Nor was there any reason, and this was vitally important, that she might eventually be forced into marrying him.