Kitabı oku: «Surrender To Love»
Praise for ROSEMARY ROGERS
“The queen of historical romance.”
—New York Times Book Review
“Returning to her roots with a story filled with family secrets, politics, adventure and simmering passion, Rosemary Rogers delivers what fans have been waiting for.”
—Romantic Times on An Honorable Man
“Her novels are filled with adventure, excitement, and always, wildly tempestuous romance.”
—Fort Worth Star-Telegram
“This is exactly what her many fans crave, and Rogers serves it up with a polished flair.”
—Booklist on A Reckless Encounter
“Ms. Rogers writes exciting, romantic stories…with strong-willed characters, explosive sexual situations, tenderness and love.”
—Dayton News
“Her name brings smiles to all who love love.”
—Ocala Star-Banner
Also available from MIRA Books and ROSEMARY ROGERS
AN HONORABLE MAN
WICKED LOVING LIES
A RECKLESS ENCOUNTER
SWEET SAVAGE LOVE
SAVAGE DESIRE
Surrender To Love
Rosemary Rogers
www.mirabooks.co.uk
To the youngest female in my family, my granddaughter Reina—and to all women who are trying to find themselves; and to the men who are strong enough to understand and help us.
CONTENTS
PART I
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
PART II
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
PART III
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
PART IV
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
PART I
1
The heat in Colombo, capital city of the British Crown Colony of Ceylon, seemed especially oppressive on this sun-scorched August afternoon. As their carriage jolted and rumbled over a newly paved street, Alexa Howard surreptitiously opened one more button on the front of her gown, thankful that Aunt Harriet appeared to have fallen asleep and wouldn’t notice.
And even if she had, Alexa would not have cared! It was ridiculous, Alexa thought mutinously as she felt unladylike rivulets of perspiration trickle down her sides and between her breasts, that women should be expected to keep up the English fashions in a hot, tropical climate. Far more suited to the prevailing temperatures was the simple costume worn by the native Sinhalese women—a piece of cotton material wrapped twice around the waist and knotted at the hip, reaching to just above the ankles, known as a “camboy.” And their only other garment was a very brief and low-cut bodice that more often than not exposed a bare brown midriff. In fact, when Alexa was in the privacy of her own room at home, that was all she wore. But now here she was in Colombo—too many miles and far too many hours away from the comparative coolness of the hill country, and encased in a steel and whalebone corset that cut into her flesh, as well as layers of stifling petticoats under a gown that was supposed to cover her from neck to wrist.
The sharp clatter of horses’ hooves on either side of the carriage made Alexa wish enviously that she too could have made this journey on horseback wearing practical breeches instead of a hampering skirt. She knew the two young officers who had volunteered to act as their escort and they knew as well as she did that she could outride and outshoot either of them. Hadn’t she proved it only three weeks ago at the boar hunt up on Horton Plains? How cool it had been that day. She remembered the feel of the fresh wind in her face and the mounting sense of excitement that kept building during the chase with the dogs leading the way—the challenge of danger that was always present on one of these hunts. Why couldn’t she have been born the male instead of her brother, Frederick, who hated getting dirty and turned pale at the sight of blood, preferring to read books and practice on the pianoforte for hours on end when he could have spent the time outdoors enjoying all that life had to offer instead?
And what does Freddy know about running a coffee plantation? Alexa began to fan herself vigorously with the newly acquired bonnet she had positively refused to don before they had set out early that morning. Why, I’m the one who acts for Papa when he has to go away, and I can keep the ledgers and talk to the overseers in their own language and…and they respect me too, even if I am a woman! Freddy doesn’t even care about learning things like that even though he’ll need to know them some day, and Mama coddles him far too much, of course! But then, rather guiltily she caught the thought back, remembering how precious her only son was to poor Mama, who had lost three other children in infancy. And that was the reason it was Aunt Harry and not her mama who was to be her chaperone at the Governor’s Ball tomorrow night. Freddy had developed a fever—a slight fever—but of course Mama couldn’t dream of leaving his side! She had been quite preoccupied with instructing the cook exactly how to prepare fresh beef tea when a sullen Alexa, hurried along by Harriet, had left the rambling bungalow at five that morning.
“Do have a wonderful time, my darling,” Mama had said earlier. “And do try to smile instead of frowning in that forbidding fashion. It was so very kind of the Governor and Mrs. Mackenzie to invite you to stay with them in Queen’s House—really quite an honor, dearest, and I’m sure you’ll make both your papa and me very proud of you. Who knows, you might just meet some nice young man in the Civil Service, and…” But at that moment Freddy had called out for Mama, and she had hurried away after bestowing a quick kiss.
Perhaps it had been just as well, Alexa thought now. Sometimes she had to almost bite her tongue to keep from arguing vehemently, especially when the conversation turned to “suitable” young men. And that was another of the things she resented. Why was it simply taken for granted that every woman’s ambition must be to “catch” some man and be married? And yet it was usually either that or end up as a governess or an unwanted poor relation hovering in the background, hiding in the shadows—eternally grateful, constantly self-effacing. Alexa fanned herself even harder, feeling her lips grow taut with anger and frustration.
“I am going to be different! Why must I be forced to choose from such poor alternatives? I’ll find some way!” Alexa remembered herself saying that, the words spilling from her hotly; and she remembered even more clearly her aunt’s cool, measured voice replying.
“My dear Alexandra, I can only hope that besides giving you an education that most young females of your age are not fortunate enough to receive I have also taught you that you must learn to be practical. Logical and reasonable in your thinking, if you prefer. At any rate I’m sure you’re intelligent enough to realize that there are certain inescapable facts of life that have to be accepted, like it or not, my dear. You were born a female—and you have no other alternatives save even more unpleasant ones that we need not discuss.”
Oh, how fiercely she had argued, and how intensely she had felt the pain and frustration of the injustice of it maul her like the claws of a leopard before she’d been forced to concede to what Aunt Harry had called the inescapable facts of life—if you were a woman, that was. She had been allowed the taste of freedom for as long as she could remember, allowed to learn and think for herself and express her own opinions—to “run wild,” as some of the neighboring planters’ wives put it. And then…
“But why have I been allowed to have such freedom if I was only meant to lose it some day?” Alexa never cried, but the words had been a cry of despair in themselves. “You know Freddy doesn’t know anything about running a plantation, and he’ll never take the trouble to learn about it. I could help him, couldn’t I? I could…”
“Could be his right-hand man until he takes a wife, who will hate you and want you out of her house? Yes, her house, Alexa, for all that you’ve looked upon it as your home for most of your life. Freddy will inherit the plantation, and when he marries it will be his wife’s home, not yours.”
All it had amounted to was that Alexa should be practical and think logically and should begin to prepare for what her future must be. It was after their talk that Alexa had finally agreed to accept the invitation to Queen’s House for the Governor’s Ball, which would really be a birthday ball held in her honor—like a “coming out.” But snatches of that unusually frank conversation with Aunt Harry still floated through Alexa’s head.
“There have been women throughout history, my dear, who were clever enough and wise enough to rule countries and empires through their men. You might remember that.” What a strange thing for Aunt Harry to have said.
“There’s the main gate of the Fort up ahead of us now. It won’t be too long before we arrive at Queen’s House!” One of the young subalterns who had escorted them leaned down from his horse to give the young woman he usually called “Alex” a grin and a wink. He grinned even more broadly when she gave him one of her famous scowls. “It’ll be a lot cooler there, you know. Sea breezes and all that. And you’ll save me a dance tomorrow, won’t you?” Seeing Alexa’s eyes narrow dangerously, he winked at her again before he straightened up hastily, turning his grin on his brother officer. Poor old Alex! She must be furious, suddenly being turned into a female. He couldn’t even recall, come to think of it, that he’d ever seen Alex in skirts before. Wonder if she knew how to dance? Well, at any rate he and Eric had talked about it in the mess last night, and they’d decided that since she was such a good sport it would only be the proper thing for them to help her out; and they’d taken a solemn oath not to laugh and tease her if she tripped over her flounces and furbelows—for one thing, she’d probably come after both of them with a pistol if they did, and, female or not, Alex had a damned cool head and a deadly aim! He’d seen that for himself, and they’d all heard the story of how she’d finished off a wounded and enraged bull elephant in mid-charge.
“Did that young man say we were almost there? Lord, I cannot believe that I actually fell asleep in spite of all the rattling and bumping around!” Straightening up, Harriet delved in her reticule for a handkerchief to mop at her face with. “I hope to goodness it’ll be cooler once we get closer to the ocean. Such heat! I’d almost forgotten how hot Colombo can be.”
Alexa had been gritting her teeth so hard that she was surprised to find her jaws were not locked together. She said with syrupy sweetness: “And were you giving me an example of how to rattle on like an empty-headed young thing, Aunt Harriet? Since I’m up on the auction block now I suppose I really must try harder, mustn’t I?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Alexa, let us not become dramatic!” The snapped-out reply sounded more like the Aunt Harry she was familiar with, at least. “And shake out your sleeves. They’re looking positively wilted in spite of the lining I had that stupid tailor stitch into them. And put your bonnet on at once! It was not meant to be a fan, you know. I don’t know who else will be staying with the Mackenzies, but I do want everyone who might be there when we arrive to know that even in the hill country we try to keep up with the latest fashions.”
Alexa’s slate-colored eyes, so dark they could look almost black, flashed dangerously even though her voice remained sweetly docile. “The latest fashions? But all the journals we receive from London are at least four or five months old! If I had been consulted I would have begged Mrs. Mackenzie to make it a fancy dress ball tonight; and then I could have attended as a Sinhalese woman and be cool all evening.”
Realizing the girl was riding on a short rein, Harriet was wise enough to shrug and say only, “Well, I’m sure that the ball gown that Sir John means to surprise you with will be truly exquisite and in the very latest style, so that you will outshine every other female there. He has such good taste!”
At the mention of her adopted “uncle,” who was one of her father’s best friends, Alexa could not help but lose some of her earlier feeling of resentment, even if he had been one of the instigators of this birthday ball for her. How could she not continue to love and respect her beloved Uncle John? It had been Sir John who had presented her with her first thoroughbred and had taught her to ride it like a man—Sir John who had taught her about guns and how to shoot and not to flinch even from the kick of a heavy elephant gun. And how she had loved being allowed to listen when Sir John and Papa would begin talking about the wars they had been in and the exciting battles they had fought under Wellington.
“I’ll wager that you wish you’d been there too, don’t you, Alex?” Sir John would tease her sometimes, but he never teased her in the condescending way of grown-ups; and Alexa would nod vigorously, her eyes wide and shining as she imagined how it must have been—the noise of cannons and the smell of powder and the keening sound of a musket ball whistling past your head; the excitement of a charge with your sword drawn, facing a screaming foe, and hand to hand combat; and if you died you died gloriously and with honor, and if you lived you always knew you had been there, so close to death that you had brushed shoulders with it and had still survived.
It was only to Sir John that an older Alexa, only a few months ago, could confide seriously: “I know it’s probably only because I’ve been hearing the stories for most of my life—yours and Papa’s—but sometimes I really feel as if I have lived through wars and battles. It seems so real, as if I know what it’s like. Even to the smell of horses and dust and blood, and the sounds of clashing swords, and how you feel inside in battle…”
He hadn’t laughed—she remembered that. “Well, my dear, I lived in India for quite some time, as you know, when it belonged to the old John Company, and the Hindus there, they believe that souls are born and reborn over and over again. And that it’s possible for some people to remember past lives. Who knows, my dear, who knows? It’s something I’ve often wondered about myself.”
Harriet, of course, could hardly know of the thoughts that had raced across her niece’s brain during the past few seconds. But by mentioning Sir John Travers she had done exactly the right thing, she recognized with relief, seeing the almost imperceptible relaxing of Alexa’s tensely held shoulders. Sighing, Harriet said, “I really hate to admit how weary I am. All those miles and miles of traveling and the change of climate—I’ll be glad of a nice cold bath, I can tell you that!” She noticed with relief that Alexa was actually putting on her hated bonnet, although she did so with a wry face, adjusting it over her decorously pulled back hair and actually tying the wide ribbons in a bow under her chin.
“If either Eric or Basil make any comments when they see me in this…!’ Alexa sounded so fiercely threatening that Harriet had to force back a smile. In spite of the fact that she would be eighteen years of age tomorrow, Alexandra could sometimes sound very much like a hoydenish little girl. But the child must face the fact that she was a woman now and a whole year older than her own mother had been when she had carried her. Poor little Victorine, so helpless, always so pretty…
As she usually did, Harriet closed her mind firmly on unwanted memories of the past. No point thinking back, was there? Victorine was safe and content now. She had a loving, considerate husband, the son she’d always craved, and she had security. The future belonged to Victorine’s daughter, and now, although she was not overly religious, Harriet thought, Pray God I’ve taught her enough and made her strong enough to survive and go forward. To be a victor instead of a loser.
“Well, ladies, here we are at last!”
The carriage had actually come to a stop, and the feeling of not being in motion was almost strange.
“Aunt Harry? Are you unwell? You looked so…”
“Nonsense! I was just thinking, that’s all. And there’s the Governor himself waiting to greet us, and Mrs. Mackenzie. Shake out your skirts, dear. And smile. It lights up your whole face when you do.”
One of the young officers had dismounted quickly enough to open the carriage door for them, and taking a deep breath Harriet squared her shoulders before she accepted the hand he proffered. Behind her Alexa too had drawn in her breath, holding it inside her until she felt calm enough to breathe out again. Yoga. She had learned about that from Sir John. And it was comforting to think that of course he would help see her through the whole ordeal ahead.
There was actually a smile on Alexa’s face that showed off the dimple at one corner of her firm young mouth, Harriet noted relievedly. And the sprigged muslin had held up remarkably well after all with its wide “Mary Stuart” sash that made Alexa’s small waist seem quite tiny.
Lady Mackenzie, who had had her misgivings about this whole idea and had only acceded to her husband’s request to please Sir John Travers, gave a tiny mental sigh of relief. The young woman was quite charming after all and seemed well-mannered too—which only went to prove that one did best not listening to gossip spread by jealous older women with daughters of their own. Why, she could see nothing mannish or forward about this very feminine young creature who actually dropped a small, old-fashioned curtsy while making her thanks for the honor being shown to her. Remembering the days when she had been married to that insufferable bore Sir Samuel Hood and had been gossiped about because she enjoyed smoking a hookah, Mrs. Mackenzie decided immediately that she was going to like Miss Howard, and would, moreover, make her coming-out ball an event that would be long remembered in Colombo.
2
When at last they had been shown to their spacious quarters and the door had closed behind the last obsequious servant, Alexa could relax again. She felt by this time as if her face ached from smiling while she uttered simpering insincerities. Thank goodness they were to be allowed to rest for the remainder of the afternoon and that at last she could take off the constricting muslin gown she already detested, as well as all five petticoats and the corset that seemed to cut off her breath.
“Oh, at last! Did I behave well enough to suit you? But I do not think that I can stand another minute—no not another second—of being smothered in all these layers of hypocrisy! I would like to tear myself free! Thank God it is cooler in here…I was beginning to feel as if I could not breathe any longer. A few more minutes and I would have…”
Used to handling her charge, Harriet faced the challenging glower directed at her with a raised eyebrow. “My dear Alexa, don’t you think that you are by now a trifle past the age for childish tantrums? I was proud of the way in which you conducted yourself just now, and I’m sure you lived up to everything Sir John must have told the Governor and his wife about you. You’re not going to let down the people who believe in you from lack of self-control, I hope?”
For a moment Alexa seemed to stand there poised like a hummingbird caught in mid-flight, and perhaps even she did not know whether she was on the brink of rebelling or running away. But then, to Harriet’s relief, the rigid young shoulders seemed to slump, and the slender fingers that had already began to claw at the neck of the offending gown dropped away.
Not defeat, Harriet warned herself. With Alexa, born under the zodiacal sign of Leo, the lion, there would never be the concession of defeat, only an occasional retreat, perhaps. Putting aside her own weariness, Harriet came forward briskly, commanding a suddenly woebegone-looking Alexa to turn around.
“No need to tear a perfectly good dress, what with the price of fine materials these days. Here, I don’t suppose you want me to send for one of those chattering little maids, do you? So I’ll undo you myself, if you’ll hold still. And do try to remember, my dear, that losing your temper is the same thing as losing your head—or losing the advantage, if you were engaged in some kind of a contest. Do you imagine you’d be any good on a hunting trip if you stopped using your head and gave in to blind panic?”
“I…I suppose I never thought about all this in the same light,” Alexa confessed, with her head bent. And then, throwing it up almost defiantly, she said, “Keeping a cool head…A hunt—is that what I am supposed to be engaged in? But who is the quarry, Aunt Harriet? The eligible man I’m supposed to capture with my false, feminine wiles? Or I myself?”
There had been an edge of cynicism and perhaps even of desperation in Alexa’s voice that forced Harriet to answer with studied brusqueness. “My dear child, I hope I did not make you imagine, with all my sermonizing, that you are being abandoned to the wolves. You must not feel that you must immediately find yourself a husband, or think that this will be your only opportunity to meet eligible men. All I meant to say was that it is more than high time you thought of yourself as a beautiful and feminine young woman to whom men are bound to be attracted and not as a sister or a plucky comrade, as some of the young officers stationed upcountry seem to regard you! Oh, for heaven’s sake! I really can’t seem to recall now what I started out to explain to you in the first place. There, that takes care of your corset. And I’d have you know that I am many years older than you are and just as hot and sticky and tired!”
For once Alexa did not kick aside each garment, as it dropped around her ankles, with a smothered, under-the-breath military oath that Harriet always pretended not to hear. She had been standing as still as a statue, and just as silent except for a slight sigh of relief as the tightly laced corset was loosened. And now, to Harriet’s disquiet, Alexa actually bent down to retrieve each offending article, one by one, something that she, used to doting servants waiting on her from babyhood, had never deigned to do before.
Alexa’s voice sounded rather smothered for a moment until she straightened, still with her back turned to Harriet. “Well, I suppose that you did not want to make this journey any more than I did, Aunt Harry, especially with Freddy being sick and Mama all flustered, and nobody to help Papa out with the ledgers and to see that he eats enough. And I suppose that I have been spoiled and allowed to run wild, and…and have thought only of myself all this time without any sense of responsibility towards other people. While everyone else around me, like you, Aunt Harry…”
Alexa swung around abruptly with her untidy bundle of clothes clutched before her, a naked pagan goddess with the sheen of unshed tears making her widely spaced storm dark eyes appear even more brilliant under uncompromisingly straight dark brows. “We all take you for granted, don’t we? But what of you? Why didn’t you ever marry? Didn’t you want to, ever?”
Harriet had always taught Alexa to be honest, to tell the truth and take the consequences if she had to, no matter what the cost. And now, without making herself too much of a hypocrite, how could she give this child-woman standing before her anything less than a direct answer to a direct question?
Harriet heard herself say in an oddly stiff voice: “The man I imagined myself in love with fell in love with someone else and married her. And I…I could never settle for second best. I think that is enough for one afternoon. Even old memories can bring painful twinges, as you might discover for yourself some day.”
Her back, as she turned to walk through the archway that led to her own connecting room, was as uncompromisingly straight as Alexa’s had been earlier; and it was only after she had pulled the heavy curtain closed to shut her into privacy that Harriet permitted herself the rare luxury of flinging herself onto her bed fully clothed and giving way to tears.
Alexa could turn into a raging termagant at times, with her volatile temper that matched her lion’s mane of gold-threaded auburn hair; but she could never bear to see suffering or pain, much less cause it herself. And she sensed only too late that her thoughtless, prying questions had somehow hurt Aunt Harry. She would have given anything to take back her words if she could, as soon as she noticed how her aunt’s face had whitened and seemed to grow stiff all of a sudden. But Aunt Harry was a trooper, and of course she would feel that she had to answer honestly, even if it hurt.
Alexa kept staring at that firmly drawn curtain that had become a barrier keeping her out, keeping her from trying to comfort her aunt in order to assuage her own feelings of guilt. The tears that she too had stubbornly been holding back had begun sliding down her face in warm, wet rivulets, but Alexa did not try to wipe them away. She almost never shed tears, and then only in private. No telltale sobbing and sniffling to give herself away to other people. Tears were punishment, assuagement, relief from tensions. Let them come now. Tomorrow she would make Aunt Harry happy and proud of her—even if the effort killed her! Yes, she’d even let her hair be tortured into those ugly, fashionable ringlets, and she would flutter her fan and giggle and even bat her eyelashes, if that was what it took to take the stricken look off Aunt Harry’s face that had been put there by her thoughtlessness.
Like the sudden tropical cloudbursts that were so common in Ceylon—never lasting too long—Alexa’s torrential flow of tears soon dried up, leaving her feeling drained and weak, as if her legs could no longer hold her up. Dropping her bundled-up clothes where she had been standing, Alexa stretched like a cat, her arms over her head as far as they could reach and then behind her back and to either side until she heard the tiny cracking sounds along her spine and shoulders that always brought comfort when she was tired or tense. And now that she had made herself relax she had barely enough energy left to slide her body between cool cotton sheets and turn her face against the pillow before sinking into the soft nothingness of sleep.
When Harriet, who had not been able to escape into sleep, came in an hour or two later, she shook her head as she looked down at Alexa’s sleeping profile, still stained by the telltale trace of tears. Automatically she reached down and pulled the covers up over the girl’s nude shoulders while she thought to herself, How resilient the young are! When Alexa woke up she would be smiling and sunny-tempered, eager to make amends for everything. That mood would last for a day or two perhaps, and then who knew what might set her off next? The pity of it was that Alexa had almost begun to think of herself as a young boy, running free. Was she really ready yet to turn into a woman?
Fortunately for her own well-being, Harriet Howard was a woman not often given to introspection. Emotion, as she had often pointed out to Alexa, was all very well sometimes, but reason and practicality had to come uppermost. One did the best one could—without being completely heartless, of course—and one survived, somehow. She had taught herself these things, and had immersed herself in books that had broadened her tiny insular world into a veritable universe, and she had learned, and had survived too, hadn’t she? Obviously, there was no such thing as a broken heart, or she would have died on that incongruously bright summer’s day when her best friend, eyes sparkling, had whispered her “secret” and had kept talking on and on without noticing how still and quiet Harriet had suddenly become. Turned into stone and just as cold by a Medusa with short, shining curls crowned by a filet of pearls and a pointed chin and red, pouting lips that men stared at. Even he. But no one had known her feelings. She had not let anyone see, even when the pain inside her screamed for release. “That’s nice. Of course I’m so happy for you. And of course I’ll be one of the witnesses.” Smiling, sensible Harriet.
Ceylon had seemed a long way from England, thank God, and unlike the other planters’ families they had never felt the urge to go “home” on leave or even to visit. Home to what?
Besides her brother, Martin, and the man whose name Harriet never permitted herself even to think, the only other human being that she had let herself love was Alexa. Alexa had needed a strong influence in her life—someone who would concentrate on her. It had not been difficult to take Alexa away from Victorine, who tended in any case to regard a baby girl as a burden inflicted upon her by fate. Victorine was a silly woman, and a helpless one—the kind of female who would cry and wring her little hands and do nothing at all to help herself even if it was a matter of survival.
Alexa, Harriet had decided a long time ago, would be brought up differently; the way Harriet wished at times that she had been brought up. Strong, self-reliant, not afraid to demand whatever she wanted, or to reach out and take it if she had to. Not above playing a role in the charades imposed by men if she had to, but always letting her head rule her heart. Hearts, they said, broke too easily, and giving way to emotion invariably made matters worse instead of better.
Alexa really must learn to control her temper, Harriet thought fretfully before she managed to regain control of her own emotions. Patience and self-control were the hardest lessons to learn, after all; but Alexa had always been possessed of a very quick mind. And if she could be brought to see tomorrow night as a challenge, it might well turn out to be the proving ground that might transform the young Amazon of the hill country into the sophisticated young lady.
The soft chimes of a clock reminded Harriet that dinnertime (and it would be an early dinner tonight, Mrs. Mackenzie had announced) was less than two hours away. Alexa had not stirred, and indeed seemed to be sleeping so soundly that Harriet could not help thinking it would be almost cruel to wake her now and have her hurry to get ready while she was still in a stupor. In fact, it would be much better to let the poor child sleep tonight and then spring her on the assembled company tomorrow when she would be rested, refreshed, and at her best.
Her mind made up, Harriet pulled briskly at a velvet bell rope that summoned at least three servants within minutes. She was in her element giving orders. A tray with an assortment of fresh fruit and a carafe of cold water that had been boiled and filtered (one couldn’t be too careful here) to be left for her niece in case she woke up, with perhaps a decanter of dry white wine as well. And for herself, she must have bath water immediately. Her authoritative commands resulted in the delivery of everything she had requested, and in less than the time she had allowed herself Harriet was bathed and dressed in a dark purple watered silk that was sedate without being dowdy.
She had already prepared the excuses she would offer on Alexa’s behalf—the strain of a long journey coupled with the excitement and natural anticipation, and a degree of nervousness, of course. The Mackenzies, who had eleven children between them, would surely understand. As Harriet descended the stairs, escorted by no less than two turbaned house servants wearing red cummerbunds over their spotless white camboys, she prepared herself for an evening of pleasant conversation and no doubt a discreet exchange of gossip once the ladies retired after dinner, leaving the men to their port and cigars.
Hearing the subdued sounds of laughter and voices, both male and female, as she descended a second flight of stairs, Harriet was doubly pleased that she had allowed Alexa to remain asleep tonight. Small, private dinner, indeed! There must be at least twenty people here, if not more, and all dying from curiosity, no doubt. Well, they would just have to wait until tomorrow, wouldn’t they, Harriet thought before she composed her features. Tomorrow we’ll show them all, Alexa and I!
3
Alexa had never been able to fall asleep easily, usually not drifting off until she was completely worn out and hardly able to keep her eyes open. But then, once asleep, she slept as heavily and as deeply as a child. There were weeks on end when she would only catnap—an hour or so in the afternoon because it was required of her, and perhaps four or five hours at night after she had finished reading whatever book she had become immersed in. Always active and used to spending as much time as she could outdoors, she seemed to exist during these periods on nervous energy alone. And it was during these times too that she was most reckless—whether she was riding by herself or hunting with the pack of hounds she had trained, or else challenging some of the young officers stationed in the district to a race over the most difficult terrain imaginable or a wager as to which of them could bag the most dangerous animal during a hunting trip. She was like a young, healthy animal herself and seemingly indefatigable, until there came a time when she would become irritable for no apparent reason and snap at everyone around her before retiring, finally, to her own room to “meditate” as she called it.
Harriet, who always recognized the signs, would usually give Alexa an hour or two before she would open the door to find her sound asleep, sometimes with her head down on her desk and sometimes sprawled out on the floor. Her sleep at such times was almost like a trance, and Harriet would have her carried to her bed and order her old ayah to sit with her, and then the girl would usually sleep from twelve to eighteen hours or more at a stretch.
“Oh! I feel reborn!” Alexa would laugh, stretching her arms high above her head. And for a while she would act as if she had in truth been renewed—sunny-tempered, easy to please, and wanting to please everyone around her, even to the extent of reading for hours on end to her brother, who adored her at these times and avoided her at others.
Usually, when Alexa had one of her “deep sleeps” as Harriet called them, she did not dream. Perhaps on this particular occasion it was the doing of the young, barefoot maid, who had drawn apart the heavy drapes that were meant to keep out the sun, and then pushed open the heavy wooden shutters to let in the smell and the sound of the restless surf along with the cool ocean breeze. But in any case, Alexa did not lie in bed as inertly as a toppled marble statue, and the habitual blackness of her sleep was laced through with strange dreams that made her twist and turn uncomfortably even though she did not want to wake up just yet.
Riding into battle, always as a man. And Uncle John asking her, “Well, Alexa, have you made up your mind yet?” About being reborn, he meant of course; and she could hear herself answer: “No, not yet. But I think I should have been born a pagan woman who would delight in nothing more than feeling without having to think; and then perhaps being born a woman would not be so bad without being hedged about with rules and regulations and people who are always telling you that to be happy and enjoy yourself is wicked!”
“Were you ever a pagan woman before? In what countries were you born as a woman?” She did not recognize the voice that had asked her that question. Perhaps it had only floated in on the sea breeze that carried with it the scents and sounds of a myriad different countries touched by the same ocean moving back and forth and back and forth uncaring what names it was given because it knew it was life and beginning and end and always.
Not wanting to dream so deeply even in her fragmented dreams, she almost surfaced as she thought…countries? Spain…why did she think Spain? Papa had fought in Spain… “bitter-sweet,” he had said of the music. Moorish influence… “they call it flamenco”…in her dream she saw herself dancing by herself in a red dress with only the sound of a guitar…then a voice…hers, somehow. Why would she sing when she was so sad? Sad…waiting…never, the words of the song said. Gone…gone…never…It had nothing to do with her!
Alexa almost woke then, but not quite. Floating between sleep and wakefulness, she heard someone playing minor chords on a guitar, a voice singing in Spanish. The almost cloying perfume of night-blooming flowers drifted into the room. Queen of the Night, Jasmine. Temple Flower. Gardenia. Alexa, knowing Spanish (as well as four other languages), understood that the song was a cry of unrequited love—of happiness followed by sadness—until it ended on an ugly, discordant note. “So, enough! There are too many centuries of bitterness embedded in the music of Spain. An English song, perhaps?”
There were more voices and sounds now, drowning out what she had almost felt and almost reached. Turning over on her side, Alexa burrowed her face into a too-soft pillow, still not wanting and not prepared to wake up quite yet. She was drifting as lightly as a lotus blossom on the surface of sleep when she heard Harriet come in, followed by a servant. A tray was to be removed and another with fresh fruit and fresh, cool water and wine brought in to replace it. She felt Harriet bend over her, pulling up the cotton sheet that had slipped down to her waist. Poor Aunt Harry. An uneasy mixture of conservative and liberal. Think free, but do conform on the surface. What had happened to the man she had loved who had married her best friend?
“Have all the young missy’s clothes been pressed before they were hung up?”
“Oh, yes, lady. I look after everything. I sit up all night if young missy want something.”
“Good. Thank you—Menika, was it? I’m sure you’ll see to everything. And I intend to go to sleep myself. No, I don’t need any help. Well, just the buttons at the back, perhaps, and then I shall manage quite well.”
Breathing evenly, Alexa floated in and out of sleep in spite of the fact that the sheet Aunt Harry had pulled up as far as her neck felt scratchy and far too hot. Poor Aunt Harry. Poor dear. She needed her sleep too…. She could hear the faint sounds of the sea from outside, and over that the sounds of carriage wheels and horses’ hooves and voices calling out good-byes. Soon everything would be quiet and the night would belong to the sounds of the sea again. The faint aroma of a cigar made her wrinkle her nostrils, and she thought: Smells like one of Uncle John’s. He always smokes the very best. And he had given her the very best of himself too. His wisdom, his understanding…
How pleasant it was to lie like this and drift along the borders of sleeping and waking. So many thoughts floated in and out of her mind without ceasing, one dream thought melting into the next. She saw herself as a rebellious, questioning child who resented the hampering skirts she was supposed to wear—until Aunt Harry took her side. And then in her next dream picture she was a pirate on a ship that rocked under her bare feet, fighting with a cutlass until the last and then, with a laugh of defiance, turning to plunge into the sea. How cool and pleasant it was, the sea. Like a friend she had always known. Green or blue or grey shading to black. Foam-tipped and salty. Both friend and foe. Nemesis or lover.
What a strange and almost startling thought. It must have been that and the chimes of the clock on top of the mahogany bookcase that made Alexa start upright in bed. Twelve. Somehow, she knew without counting how many times the same note had repeated itself. She was wide awake, all of a sudden, and she was hot and thirsty as well. The unfortunate young maid who started up almost as soon as the “English missy” did had no way of knowing at that moment, of course, that Alexa was also used to having her own way. Or that she had learned to speak both Tamil and Sinhalese, the major languages of the country, and was accustomed to getting into heated arguments with some of the young English officers who grinned and made comments like, “Alex has a way with the natives, all right. Can’t understand it.”
“Natives?” she would say, flaring up. “I suppose that’s how the Romans and the Danes and the Saxons and the French who invaded England referred to our ancestors! This is their country and we’re just visitors here—uninvited, I might add. And the civilization of the ‘natives’ of this island dates back to a time before Christ was born! You—we—all of us should be learning instead of trying to tear down in order to substitute…well look at us! Look at our clothes, look at…Have you ever wondered how primitive we must seem? As primitive, perhaps, as the barbarians who overran Rome, in the end.”
“Can’t stop Alexa when she gets on her soap box!” How it infuriated her when they wouldn’t listen, or did not want to listen perhaps, and would sometimes deliberately incite her into “laying down the law” as they called it.
But on the other hand, when it suited her Alexa could not only act but sound as imperious as any haughty English madam.
“I’m thirsty. I’ll have a very little of the wine, thank you. No fruit—I’m not hungry. And then I’d like a bath.”
“A…a bath now, Missy? With hot water brought up?”
Even in the dim light shed by two candles, Alexa could see the dismay on the girl’s face, making her relent slightly.
‘No, I don’t want hot water by any means; not in this heat. But isn’t there a bathing place here? Where do you go to bathe? In the hill country…”
The Sinhalese people made it a point to bathe at least once every day and sometimes more often if it was exceptionally hot. At a well, or a stream, or under a waterfall. Alexa looked questioningly at the pretty young woman who had to be close to her own age, and repeated her question in Sinhalese.
Understanding, the girl shook her head as she tried to explain. “Not here, Missy. There are only bath tubs and the Governor’s pool. But it has water from the sea, not fresh water. And this Governor and lady never use the Governor’s pool.”
Alexa flung aside the sheet that was supposed to cover her and swung her legs off the bed, stretching as she rose to her feet and pretending not to notice the amazement on the face of the young maid, who had obviously never seen an “English missy” naked before. “It sounds very inviting to me, at least,” she said pleasantly. “And while I drink some wine you must tell me about the pool. Is it quite private? Is it very close to the house? How long would it take for us to get there?”
Menika had been newly promoted from her hitherto lowly position of helping to make beds and fold linens, and her mother, who had served several former governors, had instructed her strictly as to what her duties were. She must obey orders, and she must never let her tongue chatter until she sounded like a mynah bird; also, she must remember that anything she heard or witnessed was never to be repeated. Did she understand? Never!
The girl understood well enough, as she always had. She knew very well too why her skin happened to be a much lighter shade of brown than her mother’s skin was—and why her eyes were hazel instead of being black. And also why her “father” was supposed to be dead. Sometimes she would wonder which Governor was her real father, and then push the thought away. Most likely he had been a guest. This Governor and his lady made sure that Menika attended only their women guests; but before there had been times when she had been obliged to lie with some drunken, bad-smelling Englishman who would use her body without any consideration before sending her away with a slap on her bottom and perhaps a few rupees, if he was sober enough to think of it. For as long as she could remember, Menika had always understood what life was and had accepted both its cruelties and its rewards. In her heart she was a Buddhist, although like her mother and the rest of the servants who served the English Governors who came and went at Queen’s House, she had to pretend she was a Christian convert in order to keep her position. It did not matter—the ritual she had learned to repeat parrot-fashion held no meaning for her. It was what people thought and believed inside themselves and how they lived their lives—never consciously harming any living being—that was all that really counted.
Usually, when she attended the Governor’s guests, Menika merely obeyed orders and answered questions as briefly as she could. She had never encountered a guest before who could speak her own language, or who was not ashamed of standing naked before a servant while she sipped wine and asked to be told more about the Governor’s pool.
“Oh, did you unpack for me? Thank you! I must find something cool to wear…” From one of the sandalwood-scented drawers Alexa took out her most comfortable costume—the camboy and brief, low-cut bodice of the Sinhalese peasant women. She could detect no change of expression in the face of the young servant woman who stood waiting respectfully for her next command. Menika. Yes, that was her name; she had heard Aunt Harry say it. A pretty name that meant “precious gem.” And Menika herself was pretty, and deserved more than a life of waiting on other people. But what other alternatives did she have either? I wish I could talk to her and find out how she feels and what she thinks, Alexa thought; but there was a barrier between them that had been put there by circumstances and a rigorously enforced system of etiquette and convention that bristled with rules and reminders of what was done and “simply not done.”
So instead of saying what she really wanted to say, Alexa walked to the opened windows and looked out, asking over her shoulder, “Is tonight the night of the full moon?”
“It is the night after the Poya, as the Buddhists call the night of a full moon.” Menika corrected herself quickly, hoping her slip had not been noticed. She had stolen a few minutes to visit a temple yesterday—Poya Day to the Buddhists—and even her mother knew nothing about it.
“My ayah is a Buddhist and I’ve gone with her to temple on Poya Day a few times,” Alexa said mildly. “Our temple has a pet cobra who likes milk, of all things! He’s really quite affectionate after you get to know him.” And then, so unexpectedly that she reminded a confused Menika of a striking cobra herself, Alexa went on to say brightly: “But of course an almost-full moon on such a clear night as this means that we should find our way to this bathing pool quite easily, don’t you think?” She added patiently, noticing the look of shock on Menika’s hitherto expressionless face, “The Governor’s pool that you were telling me about.”
“The missy is joking, surely?”
“I most certainly am not! I want to swim in the moonlight without any clothes on, like a pagan! And I can swim—very well indeed—so you need not be afraid that I will drown and they’ll blame you. Also…” Alexa sighed, “do you think as long as we are alone you could stop calling me missy and call me Alex, or Alexa instead? In any event, I must tell you that I am determined to go anyway, with or without your help, now that my mind is made up. Although I promise I’ll be very discreet and not get you into any trouble. Well?” And then: “Please?”
On the verge of offering Menika a bribe of a gold bracelet or several rupees, Alexa thought better of it and instead used the courteous word karunakolla, which also meant please but was for the most part used between equals and implied respect for the other person at the same time.
“You shouldn’t ask such a thing of me. If the other lady wakes up she will be very angry and blame me! And it might not be safe to swim there alone. Colombo is full of thieves and bad men who might think, seeing you dressed like…not like an English lady…”
“We are surely not going to be troubled by any desperate characters in the gardens of Queen’s House? I remember seeing uniformed guards everywhere when we arrived.” Alexa’s voice went from coaxing to teasingly mischievous. “Oh, do unbend for once, Menika! Have you never been tempted to do something forbidden? Isn’t there any special friend that you sometimes slip out to meet? I’m sure you know how we can avoid running into any of the sentries, who are all probably asleep or playing cards at this hour anyway. And I’ll go barefoot, and be very quiet, I promise you. Look, I’ll even take my little pistol just in case we run into a snake—of any species! And I can use it too. I never miss.”
Caught between what Sir John Travers, who was a scholar, would have termed “Scylla and Charybdis,” poor Menika found herself left with no real choice after all. She could hardly let this unusual young Englishwoman try to find the tiny natural inlet known as the Governor’s pool by herself, for if she got lost or something happened to her, she, Menika, would be blamed for everything. But on the other hand, this young Englishwoman wore the costume of the people without a trace of awkwardness, and she had just proved by the swiftness and ease with which she had loaded her pistol that she was quite familiar with such weapons, this one now carefully hidden in the folds of a lace shawl.
If I do as she wishes perhaps it will not turn out badly after all, Menika thought consideringly. After all, she acts as if she can take care of herself as well as any man, and there is no soft fat on her body. Perhaps, once her wish is gratified she will grow bored and want to return. And besides, hadn’t she actually asked her politely instead of ordering?
Sensing surrender, Alexa smiled at Menika, impatiently running fingers through the heavy mass of her hair before twisting it into a knot at the nape of her neck.
“Come, let’s go quickly on this adventure, and I promise not to take too long. And as for my aunt, I know she’ll sleep soundly until morning. She’s probably taken one of her headache powders as she usually does when she is tired and wants to sleep without interruption.”
Resigning herself, Menika bowed her head. “If you are determined, then it would be better, I suppose, if I took you by the easiest and safest way. There is a back staircase that is used only by servants, and it is very narrow—you will have to watch your footing. And there is a secret path. I have never used it myself, but my mother who has worked here for many, many years showed it to me once. There are no guards posted along that path or about the bathing pool either. A previous Governor gave the order…” Menika’s eyes darted to the face of her unlikely companion, and detecting no shock but only a lively curiosity, went on in a soft voice: “He was a man who, like most men, enjoyed women. Others, beside his wife.” Speaking in her native tongue instead of the pidgin English she had acquired, Menika seemed much more at ease. Now she said hastily, “But please, from this moment we must be very quiet. There are guards close by.”
Hurrying along on bare feet over dew-damp grass, feeling and relishing with a mounting sense of exhilaration the freedom from the restriction of layer upon layer of heavy clothing, Alexa wanted to laugh out loud. With Menika leading the way they slipped between tall hedges that shut out most of the moonlight, following a path that was almost completely grassed over so that it was now a mere track. An owl hooted from somewhere close by, and the fragrance of flowers lingered in the air. Some people would have called this a romantic night, but to Alexa it was only another example of the beauty of nature itself. And now, sensing the nearness of the ocean, she began to long for the feel of silky-cool water against her skin…to be floating on her back while she watched the moon float above her, and feeling herself rocked gently by the motion of the never-still sea.
“The…the cry of the owl…it is supposed to be a bad omen!” Menika was obviously nervous.
“Nonsense!” Alexa said as bracingly as Harriet might have done. “The owl is only awake at night. Does the twittering of birds in the daytime alarm you? There is nothing frightening or mysterious about the night; it is merely a time when the sun is shining on the other side of our world…when the sun is resting,” Alexa quickly amended, catching the puzzled look Menika threw over her shoulder.
“I had never thought about it that way,” the girl said with a note of surprise in her low voice. And then she broke off suddenly to point ahead. “That is the place. It was not made by any person, but by the sea itself, slipping through that narrow opening there to form a protected bathing place. But the former Governor I told you about had rough steps cut into the rocks. See? On this side. The pool, however, is quite deep, so I have heard.”
“How beautiful! And especially under the moon! Don’t you want to come in too? I could teach you how to float if you’d trust me.”
“No…no!” Menika stepped backward apprehensively. “I cannot swim, and I would not dare try the water. It frightens me. Please, perhaps we should return to the house? The water looks so black where the moon does not touch it, and it keeps moving as if it was breathing…”
“Well, I’m going in, and this is probably the last opportunity I will have to swim out in the open—under the sky—without all the hampering clothes I shall be expected to wear all the time now, I expect. Oh, how I hate clothes, and everything they represent! Repression—hyprocrisy—sham!” Alexa was talking to herself, almost, as she removed the skimpy bodice and tossed it aside before undoing the carelessly tied knot that held her improvised “skirt” about her hips. She stood there in the moonlight like a naked Greek goddess carved out of marble, stretching her arms out wide over her head with an almost primitive sense of ecstasy she did not quite understand herself as she paid homage to the moon and to the ocean—both female like herself. And then she said carelessly, “Are you sure it’s deep?” and dived in without waiting for a reply, her body cleaving through black and silver with hardly any splash at all—coming up for air with her hair dripping and hanging heavily down her back; the reflected shine of the moon gleaming off her wet skin as well.
“Ohh! It’s wonderful! And actually quite warm too. Do join me, Menika. Be daring just this once! I can swim and I promise to look after you.” But the girl only shook her head, backing off as she glanced nervously behind her.
“Please, if you do not mind I will wait here for you and watch.” There was no budging her for all Alexa’s coaxing; and all she would say, stubbornly, was, “I will wait, and guide you back when you are ready.”
In the end, seeing Alexa begin to swim back and forth—sometimes diving under water like a fish and coming up some moments later to shake back her long, strangely colored hair—Menika decided resignedly that she might as well rest for a while, since she was tired and had hoped to snatch a few hours of sleep tonight. Retreating a short distance into the shadows thrown by the shrubbery that had been allowed to grow wild at this particular place, Menika leaned her back against a tree, tucking her feet under her. Oh, but she was tired! She had been awake since five in the morning and had been working ever since. Perhaps if she could just close her eyes for a few minutes…
Poor little thing, Alexa thought contritely as she came up for air, delighting in the salty tang and taste of the sea. Perhaps she should forgo her own selfish pleasure and go back for Menika’s sake. But then, watching the riding lights of a ship that was anchored some distance away, beyond the coral reef that protected this part of Ceylon’s coast from sharks and enormous breakers that could crush any unwary bathers, Alexa decided that she might just as well enjoy herself and the glorious feeling of freedom that bubbled in her veins. She had never done anything this daring before. Swimming stark naked in the Governor’s private pool on a moonlit night. What if the Governor himself had the same idea? She had to resist the impulse to giggle at that thought. Not the Right Honorable James Alexander Stewart Mackenzie, most certainly! Balding, bespectacled and quite overshadowed by his wife, whose name he had adopted upon their marriage, he was hardly the kind of man who would dare to stray—and especially since he was devoutly religious as well. Or so Aunt Harriet had warned her, begging that Alexa should on no account enter into any kind of discussion on religion or religions, as the case may be.
Well, I did promise everyone that I was going to behave and be a credit to them all, Alexa reminded herself stoutly. But that is tomorrow, and tonight is mine alone…my last secret adventure, perhaps. Just for tonight I can be what I feel and what I am. Turning on her back, Alexa floated lazily again, letting the slight swell of the water rock her while she stared back at the silver face of the moon and let her thoughts wander as they pleased.
4
How gentle the ocean was tonight, with hardly a wave to break its smooth, swelling surface; and how bright the moon, splintered into a thousand, a million tiny silver fragments that danced along the gentle swells. A magical, enchanted night with the moon a fairy godmother who could turn every hidden, secret wish into reality for just a few precious hours. Alexa knew that Harriet would have frowned and told her that she should think rationally. Learn to be more practical. But how she hated that word! Ah, tonight was meant only for fantasy…was only a fantasy, perhaps, as she felt herself caught up in a silver-spangled web that transported her into a magical place where wishes came true and anything was possible if you closed your eyes and believed hard enough.
Almost mesmerized into believing she could disappear into the silver eye of the moon as she stared into it, Alexa found herself remembering the fairy tales that Mama used to read to her when she was very young and Freddy hadn’t even been born yet. Stories of handsome Princes, and Princesses with long golden hair that could be let down castle walls. Of dragons that could spit fire, and tall giants and twisted gnomes. Enchanted forests and bramble bushes that could grow in the twinkling of an eye to shut in a sleeping beauty who could only be awakened from her slumbers by a kiss. “Stuff and nonsense!” Aunt Harry used to scold. “The child’s head shouldn’t be filled with fantasies and falsehoods that have nothing to do with real life!” But what was wrong with escaping from real life sometimes into the magic world of fantasy where anything was possible? To imagine herself the fairy princess held captive by the spell of the wicked magician—waiting, wrapped about in her silver-webbed sleep for the Prince who was destined to rescue her. Or a pagan sacrifice like Andromeda, waiting for her Perseus. Waiting, like a moon-silvered statue, for…it did not matter. She felt herself flow into the moon and felt the moon flow into her, and she was magic and part of the night itself that was the birthday gift of her fairy godmother. A gift of magic…
Still floating languidly, Alexa suddenly felt a different, almost agitated motion of the water beneath her. A sudden wave that had managed to force its way in through the tiny entrance to this miniature bay? A splash…? No, her own moon-fevered imagination. What had she expected, a sea monster? She should not have let herself stare so hard at the moon that she became altogether lost in the fantasies her imagination surrounded her with. There was no one, and nothing here but poor sleeping Menika and herself. Annoyed at herself, Alexa closed her eyes for an instant against the silver brightness that seemed reflected everywhere, and began to tread water while she pushed annoying strands of wet, clinging hair from her eyes. So much for fantasy!
And then, on the very heels of that particular thought Alexa almost felt her heart stop as she felt something touch her. Seaweed? Then the strangest sensation of having her skin stroked underwater, all the way up from her calves to the length of her thighs. Not a shark? No, only some large fish that had somehow managed to find its way in here through the narrow opening that separated this pleasant little pool from the sea beyond it? Suddenly frozen and losing all power of motion for some seconds Alexa felt herself sink under water, to come up gasping and spluttering and blinded momentarily again by her water-logged hair, which clung to her face and neck like choking strands of seaweed. Helplessly, and unbelievingly, she could feel herself being moved backward in the water until her back scraped uncomfortably against a rocky-surface—one of the “steps” hewn into the rock here on the land side of the pool. She was still quite incapable of speech, having accidentally allowed herself to swallow a considerable amount of salty water, and barely capable of thought either until she heard an unmistakably human voice that held an annoying undercurrent of amusement.
“Well, well! I seem to have caught myself a mermaid! Or is it a sea witch? One of old Neptune’s wicked daughters?”
It was also, Alexa realized belatedly, unmistakably a pair of human hands that held her hard, and far too familiarly about the waist at this moment. And if only she was not still choking and coughing in a most unladylike way she would have used some of the barracks slang she had picked up from some of the young officers who sometimes forgot that she was a female. Oh damn, damn, she thought; why did her damned hair always have to get in the bloody way? How often she had longed to be able to crop it off! She shook her head fiercely, pushing heavy tangles back from her temples, and found herself looking into a face that was far too close to hers—a face she could hardly see, because the moon was at his back.
Alexa had not, until tonight, ever really believed in superstition or ancient legends; but now without her willing or her wanting, the sudden memory of her earlier fantasy thoughts raced through her mind. A man (and she knew instinctively that he was as naked as she was) who had risen out of the sea—or so it seemed. Had she managed, by some impossible accident, to conjure up some dark spirit from the ocean depths? Poseidon? No, Lucifer himself—no fairy prince! She could only see him as an outline against moon-bright sky and water…archetypal man, as pagan and primitive as the night itself. Alexa felt spellbound; and she had never known the meaning of that word until now. As if she too had been turned by a silver-tipped wand into someone else. As if, while she had lain floating on her back and offering herself to the moon she had suddenly had her offered sacrifice capriciously taken up and had lost herself. Even her voice, since her vocal cords seemed to have become frozen and immobilized like the rest of her senses as she stared into the darkness of a face she could not see.
“I never thought to wonder whether mermaids could speak or not…and perhaps it’s better they don’t. Is that why you’re such temptresses?”
The man’s voice was rough, because he had had time to study her face in the moonlight, and he did not like to admit, even to himself, the unwanted emotions it aroused in him. It was a different face, one which might indeed have belonged to some mythical creature, whether sea nymph or siren. Wet hair always looked dark, but hers seemed to have strange shimmers of light shot through its wet, curly masses wherever the moon happened to touch it. Well-defined dark brows were etched against the pale oval of her face; and her eyes? They reflected the moon in miniature, but were they black? Dark grey? He had the instinct that they would be, even in daylight, the kind of eyes no one could read.
He had spoken to her twice and she hadn’t answered—had just continued to stare at him with those strange dark and silver witch-eyes. Was she only held transfixed by terror, or was it possible that she could not understand English? Perhaps she was the pretty Eurasian mistress of one of the English officers or the Governor himself; or a trespasser afraid to be found swimming in the Governor’s private pool. Whoever she was he hadn’t meant to scare the poor girl out of her wits when he’d navigated that little channel underwater. He’d meant to come to this place late tonight to swim in privacy, and then he’d seen her, hardly believing his own eyes. A naked pagan goddess under the moon, as open and unashamed of her nakedness as the women of Tahiti and the Sandwich Islands; women who had not yet had civilization trap them and change them from natural to artificial products of an unnatural society. Who was she? Ah, but did it really matter?
Almost unconsciously he had been looking at her parted lips, noticing that they were chiseled and well-shaped. Tempting lips. And so, without thinking, he bent his head and kissed them, acting purely out of instinct, his hands sliding up from her waist to her shoulders to bring her body closer against his. He wanted to taste and feel the texture of her lips, her mouth, to feel the pressure of her high, pointed breasts against his chest as they rose and fell like the sea itself with the motion of her breathing. He wanted much more than that, and his loins told him so; but he did not relish the thought of rape, and enjoyed seduction and the building up of desire that was mutual—the long, lazy enjoyment of lovemaking. So all he did for the moment was enjoy kissing his captive mermaid, who, as he had already discovered, possessed two long, sleek legs instead of a tail. And he kissed her gently at first, savoring the salt taste of her, the faint answering tremor he felt under his seeking mouth in the beginning and then under his hands. He could sense that she was like a shy, only half-tamed animal that might spring away in panic or begin to struggle desperately to escape if he moved too fast. But God, she had the sweetest, most temptingly perfect body in the world; and when at last her mouth yielded to him and her head fell back against his arm it was hard to remember patience.
And as for Alexa herself, she was still in a kind of trance. A dreamlike feeling of unreality had taken hold of her, while in the depths of her mind she wondered if, like some bold Greek maiden of ancient times who had dared challenge the gods, it was her fate to be held captive forever in the silver-webbed spell spun by the moon while strange sensations she had never experienced before chased themselves up and down her spine before spreading all through her body; making it feel unaccountably weak. She had never been, never wanted to be, kissed by a man, and yet it was happening and she was enjoying it! Even when she felt his hands caress her body, touching her everywhere like an exploration, it was as if the slightest brush of fingers over her skin explored her senses as well—evoking feelings she had not known existed within herself, making her feel breathless and no longer in control of anything that was happening to her.
She heard him whisper against her ear as his lips left her mouth and moved there on a trail of burning kisses, “I want you, sea witch. Silver moon maid. But you know that, don’t you?”
He “wanted” her? What did he mean by that? Did he mean to carry her off with him somewhere into the depths of the sea or wherever he had come from? Who was he, what was he? And what was it she was supposed to know? With a concentrated effort that cost her almost all of the strength she had left in her, Alexa tore herself free and dived back into the water, swimming vigorously as she tried to gather her already scattered wits about her. Moon maid, he had called her. Moon mad was more like it! Lunatic…now she realized how the word had been coined.
When she came up for air, shaking wet hair away from her face, Alexa found him before her again. Without her knowing it, she was playing the coquette—going from the innocent playfulness of a moon child to deliberate teasing. The cynical side of the man’s mind told him that she was playing a calculated game with him. Of course! Wasn’t that what most women were taught from infancy? Sweet deception. Blow hot, and then cold. Tease and pretend while you played “catch me if you can”; a game guaranteed to drive a man to his knees. But the fact remained that she was here like a fantasy turned flesh and blood—a naked nymph whose shoulders gleamed like silver in the light of a sinking moon—and he was the mortal man who had come upon her by accident, overcome by desire for her, as she probably knew very well!
Alexa still could not make out his features too well, although she could at least see that he was dark-complexioned. And although his English had been impeccable, he had a slight accent she could not quite recognize. Was he a gentleman? But then, how could he take her for a lady? It suddenly occurred to her that in spite of all the books she had read on almost every subject under the sun and in so many different languages, there were still many things of which she remained ignorant. Like…well, how did one act if you found yourself alone with a strange man on a moonlit night and neither of you had any clothes on?
Irrepressibly, Alexa started to laugh, perhaps as much from nerves as from the awkwardness of the situation she found herself in. But he did not laugh with her. In fact his voice sounded as if he was gritting his teeth while he spoke.
“You find something laughable about this?”
“I’m nervous! I always laugh when I’m nervous. And none of this seems quite real yet…”
It was the feeling she had that his body was suddenly poised—for attack? Assault?—that made Alexa suddenly break off in mid-sentence and turn in panic to swim for the steps again. But as she had half-dreaded and half-anticipated he was there before her to bar her way to safety and security. Ridiculous! She, Alexa Howard, had never been cowardly enough to run away from danger, and of course she was not afraid! And yet, when she felt his arm go around her, she could not help the sudden tremor that ran up under her skin.
As if they were merely continuing a polite conversation he said casually, with his head bent to hers, “What is it, mermaid? What did you suddenly think of? And were you thinking or—calculating?”
“Calculating? And what do you mean by that?” Indignantly, Alexa tried to shrug off his arm as she added, “Not that it matters in the least, of course; except that you have intruded upon my privacy, and you…”
“Indeed?” His drawling voice made her hackles rise instinctively as he continued sarcastically: “But then, you see, I had counted upon having some privacy myself tonight, and I happen to know that you are not the Governor’s wife nor the wife of the Lieutenant Governor either. In fact, I really cannot imagine you as the wife of any one of the very proper British gentlemen I’ve met, for that matter…having the courage to go out swimming under the moon without a stitch of clothing on! Which makes me wonder about you, sweet sea nymph…”
“Oh!” Alexa felt her face grow hot and was glad he could not know it. It was quite insufferable, as well as ungentlemanly of him to mention it, of course. Sitting one step lower than he was, she slid herself deeper into the water until her shoulders were safely covered; and hearing his soft, amused chuckle at her strategy, Alexa would dearly have loved to use her nails on him. But instead, controlling herself with an effort, she said stiffly: “Since I happen to be a guest at Queen’s House, I can only believe that you must be the trespasser here. And if you had any decency you would leave at once! In fact, I don’t even think you are English! Where did you come from anyhow? I’m sure you have no rights to be here, and if you are wise you’ll leave before…”
She did not quite like the sound of the short laugh that cut off her half-uttered threat as he said: “Before…what? Would you call the sentries and let them see you as you are now? A guest at Queen’s House? I had guessed you for some lucky man’s light of love, not His Excellency the Governor’s, for I don’t think his wife would permit him such an indulgence; but perhaps one of his senior officers? Obviously one of the older ones, or you would not be out here by yourself to seek your solace from the moon and the sea, would you?”
Her volatile temper boiling to the surface at last, Alexa snapped cuttingly, “By God! And now you’ve made it obvious that you are not only without manners but a depraved, degenerate…”
“You left out pervert and libertine,” he pointed out in a casual tone of voice that took Alexa by surprise. And then he said savagely, almost beneath his breath, “But if I’m no gentleman and all that you think I am, my little mermaid, then neither are you a lady! I think you’re a flirt and a hypocrite.”
“That’s not true!” Alexa flared up.
“It isn’t? Then why are you afraid to prove it, little liar? Or are you going to seek safety behind the convenient wall of convention and mortal sin?” His voice, deceptively calm to begin with, had suddenly turned into an animal snarl that almost frightened her. But then, before she had time to think further, his arms captured her again; and he began to kiss her, sliding his body against and over hers until she was held trapped and helpless. And this time his kisses were not gentle as he cut off her half-formed protests by the pressure of his hard mouth over hers. They were demanding and almost savage, these kisses; and when she fought, almost by instinct, to free herself from the encroachment of his body over and against hers, it was only to discover that he was much stronger than she was—and in the end, and even more frighteningly, that her body did not, inexplicably, really want to escape.
He was touching her everywhere—everywhere, even though she wriggled and tried to twist and turn herself free. And nothing in her upbringing or her schooling, as unconventional as it was by the standards of the day, had prepared Alexa for the wild and almost overwhelming tumult of emotion and sensation that raced through every vein in her body and rendered all the rational, practical commands of her mind futile. She heard herself moan and felt the shudders that shook her whole body when he touched her in certain ways, despising herself with the one small detached part of her mind that remained sane and actually relishing all the new sensations that had suddenly begun to erupt in her with all the force of a volcano. What was happening to her? What did it mean? How could she let it happen, this feeling of senses taking over from mind and reason until thought was only a vague pinprick?
Caught and trapped in a daze of unfamiliar emotions and feelings, Alexa was only half-aware of leaving the softly undulating coolness of water for the wetness of dew-damp grass. They had climbed the steps, still holding on to each other, and had almost fallen down together soon after.
The moon had slipped even lower in the blue-black sky, moving inexorably towards the horizon that was defined by the dark line of the Indian Ocean. Silver reflections still danced and shimmered off the surface of the pool they had just left and the sea beyond it; and Alexa could still see the twinkling orange riding lights of the ship she had noticed earlier, anchored at Colombo Roadstead. She saw without really seeing because for the moment only feeling was uppermost in her.
The grass had not been cut for some time, and it felt scratchy and coarse against her skin. And with his hands roving over her body—seeming to know, diabolically, just where to linger—Alexa found her breath first coming faster and then catching in her throat as she began to wonder helplessly what she was doing lying here with a stranger and allowing him to take such liberties with her. Harriet had never warned her about this—no one had! He was lying on his side with his body touching hers along its length; and when his fingers began to play teasingly with her breasts—making taut, aching points of her nipples before he bent his dark, wet head to kiss each one in turn—she wondered why she did not seem to have the strength to roll her body away from his and thought that she must have been made mad by the moon. Because she was suddenly frightened by so many strange feelings inside herself that she did not understand—this sensation of being swept away on a surging tide she could not control, making her body ache and tingle and want…? That was what he had said before. Want what? She was afraid—of him and of everything he was making her feel in spite of herself.
“No!” Alexa heard herself moan softly in protest. “No…no more…please stop!”
“And why is it that women always cry ‘no’ when they really mean ‘yes’?” He reared himself up on one elbow to look down at her, and the meaning of his caustically uttered words acted like a glass of ice-cold water thrown in her face.
With a catlike swiftness that took him by surprise Alexa twisted away and sat back on her haunches as she glared down at him. “I suggest that you go find these women you are so familiar with who say no when they mean yes and do as you please with them! But as for me, I detest that insufferably superior attitude of yours, and you can…”
By now he had sat up too; and unfairly, she still could not read his shadowed face as he held her wrists for a moment and said: “Listen, moon maid…mermaid…witch…whatever you are. Why should we waste time on questions or arguments on a night like this? We’re strangers brought together by Fate and we’ll probably never meet again. But why not make the most of the present? I could not fall asleep tonight, for some reason, and so I decided to swim out here and try out the Governor’s pool, and I found you. And I want very much to make love to you, moon maid. Right here and right now.”
His hand reached out to touch her face, and Alexa flinched away nervously, never wanting to lose herself again under the touch of a stranger’s hands. Within an hour’s time he had used her far too familiarly and had turned her into a shameless wanton—a bold, reckless hussy. Her hair lay in tangled, sea-wet curls about her face and shoulders, and although she could not know it, the way in which she stared at him in startled silence reminded the man of a frightened doe—and was unaccountably annoying to him. Now what was she playing at? She had yielded, teased coquettishly and then yielded again before this latest display of temperament. How dare she suddenly glare at him as if he had mortally insulted her?
“For Christ’s sake! What is the matter with you now? Or is it that you dislike plain speaking? Should I have seduced you without words instead? When I first saw you, swimming naked under the moon so naturally, I had the feeling that you might be different. Why must you suddenly insist on playing a game of charades?”
Each contemptuous word was like a stone that had been flung at her, sinking into vulnerable, sensitive flesh. He thought…but of course he would think the worst, and no wonder. She had allowed him to think, all this time, that she was one more of the quick, easy conquests he was no doubt used to. How humiliating the thought was!
Almost unconsciously, Alexa’s small white teeth had begun to worry her lower lip, and her eyes had narrowed dangerously—both signs that would have made her Aunt Harriet watchful and that made him aware intuitively that he had said something to make her as furious as a spitting cat, suddenly. He watched her warily now, outwardly relaxed but half-expecting her to leap at him like the wild creature she had begun to remind him of at this moment, when only seconds before he could have sworn she was one of the few women who might appreciate honesty and openness in place of flattery and guile.
Breaking the tensely-stretched silence between them, he said quietly, “I have the impression that I’ve said something to make you angry, even if I did not mean to do so. What was it?”
Instead of mollifying her, his speech only seemed to make her even more angry, her lips drawing back from her gritted teeth as if she belonged, in fact, in the depths of some primeval forest—an animal as wild and as untamed as every other that lurked there.
“Why should your ‘plain speaking’ make me angry? Or your ‘seduction without words’? I wish you could repeat your speech so that I could learn it by heart! Is it one of your favorite gambits when you think you are dealing with some gullible female?”
Oh, hell! he thought disgustedly, all the more annoyed at himself for letting the advantage slip so easily into her grasp. He should have been more cautious, more careful with her; and most of all he would have liked to act the brutal savage and snatch her into his arms without thinking about seduction, wrestling her into submission while he kept kissing her into silence and caressed that magnificently long-limbed body of hers that gleamed like polished marble in the moonlight. Making her as wild with desire as he was, although he had sensed instinctively by now that it was too late for that. Damn!
“Do you make up a new speech for every occasion that arises?” Her overly honeyed voice cut through his thoughts, and he gave her a considering kind of look that made her scramble to her feet rather too hastily to match the air of cool, detached dignity she belatedly tried to portray. “Not that it matters…. It’s time I returned before I’m missed….” And where was Menika? She had been sleeping (supposedly) right there in the shadow of the tall hedge. Where had she gone? How much had she witnessed?
“Are you sure you don’t need an escort? A beautiful young woman can never be certain what kind of depraved monster she might run across on a night like this!”
“Thank you, if that was meant to be an offer; but I have a pistol,” Alexa said coldly. “And I am accounted an excellent shot by everyone who knows me. On the last hunt we were on I bagged the most game….” She wished that he would not watch her so intently as she attempted to knot the camboy around her waist while holding the pistol she’d grabbed up hastily from the folds of her discarded shawl in one hand. And fastening up tiny buttons across her breasts proved even more difficult under his interested survey.
“If you need any help I should be glad to oblige you…without any more attempts on your virtue I assure you. Pistols have always made me cautious.”
“I don’t need anything from you!” Alexa snapped waspishly, wishing he would not lie there so casually, as if he felt quite at home, and watch her in a suddenly detached fashion. And damn and double damn! The silly little buttons on her bodice wouldn’t fasten easily, and holding the pistol made it even more awkward. In fact, she had almost fired it accidentally a minute ago while trying to get one arm at a time into the short, tight sleeves. He could have tried to make a grab for it if he had really wanted to, she supposed resentfully, but quite clearly he had already decided she wasn’t worth either the effort or the risk. Forgetting herself, Alexa swore under her breath—one of the very worst oaths she had overheard.
“Are you sure you don’t need help? Or an escort? Unless, of course, you happen to have a jealous husband or lover waiting for you…?”
“That’s enough out of you!” Alexa said furiously, leveling her pistol at him, and angry enough to fire it too. “What I do and where I go is none of your business; and since you are an obvious trespasser, why don’t you go back to wherever you came from?”
“I suppose I might as well, since you are so plainly capable of looking after yourself.” His drawling voice sounded almost indifferent as he came easily to his feet without any signs of embarrassment and stretched, making Alexa remember guiltily a picture she had once seen—a painting of a naked man that Uncle John had told her was a reproduction of a sculpture by Michelangelo. There were the muscles rippling under smooth skin, the width of shoulders narrowing down to the hips. And she remembered unwillingly and far too well the hardness she had felt pressing along her thighs. Although she had not been told too much about what Harriet termed “certain unpleasant topics,” she had lived for most of her life on a plantation, and the South Indian laborers were remarkably open and uninhibited about every facet of their lives. Since she understood their language she had heard many things she had not quite understood until now. Until tonight…
“Good night, sweet moonwitch. Or should I say good morning? You really should hurry back before they send a search party out for you.”
She would have dearly enjoyed the pleasure of shooting him if he had given her only the slightest provocation, Alexa thought. How dare he pretend to tease her in such a familiar fashion?
“Oh, go away! And I hope you drown!”
“You really are a vicious little bitch, aren’t you? Well, don’t worry, I’m a good swimmer, and my ship isn’t as far away as she looks. Adios!”
She might have actually fired her pistol at him after that impudent speech and the crude expression he’d used to describe her; but his body was already cleaving the silverblack surface of the water by the time she thought of it, disappearing underneath it and staying under long enough to make her stand there irresolutely while she wondered if perhaps he’d dived into a place that was too shallow and was drowning…?
And then she heard a low whistle and saw him, well beyond the inlet now and out to sea, turning lazily onto his back for an instant to lift one arm in a mocking salute before he began to swim in earnest again, making for the distant-seeming ship whose lights she had noticed much earlier.
So he was nothing more than a common sailor, with a different woman in every port, no doubt! And thank God I am not likely to set eyes on him ever again, Alexa thought guiltily, not wanting to be reminded of her own weakness. It had been her fault for giving in to ridiculous flights of fancy, a willing victim caught in a moon-spun web of dreams. Practical—Aunt Harry was right, of course. Only children allowed themselves to play at games of make-believe.
In spite of all her self-castigation, Alexa could not help turning to look after him just once more—an unwilling glance over her shoulder. But the moon was dipping low over the horizon by now and turning to gold; and she could make out nothing at all against the pewtered surface of the sea.
As if she had been a wraith, Menika suddenly seemed to materialize from nowhere as Alexa turned back again.
“I waited here for the missy, where the light of the moon did not shine in my eyes and blind me. But please, we must hurry now!”
It was much wiser and much safer not to ask questions, Alexa supposed as she followed the girl silently. Not even of herself, perhaps; like wondering how she might be feeling now if she had yielded to the temptation of a devil moon and a man who had reminded her of Lucifer himself.
5
Both silent, each wrapped in her own thoughts, the two young women, who were so unlike each other except for being about the same age, were fortunate enough to regain the safety of Alexa’s room without being discovered. Luckily for them the young soldiers who had the night watch were too busy fighting sleepiness at this hour of the morning to be as alert as they were supposed to be; and even more fortunately, Aunt Harry was still asleep and snoring lightly when Alexa finally went back to bed.
Alexa had already decided, very firmly, that nothing had happened. She had slept the night through, with Menika watching over her, and even if she had dreamed occasionally…well, dreams were nothing more than figments of a fevered imagination and had no significance at all.
After going down alone to an early breakfast, Harriet shook her head at finding her niece still asleep when she came back upstairs. Alexa’s pillow was hugged to her and the rumpled sheet barely covered her hips. Really, Harriet thought exasperatedly, I must try and make Alexa understand that young ladies—any lady for that matter—do not go to bed quite naked. Alexa possessed at least four pretty nightgowns, none of which she had ever worn yet. What must the servants think?
Looking about the room, Harriet’s observant eyes had noticed that there was fresh fruit and a fresh carafe of water placed by Alexa’s bed, and that her rumpled traveling dress had been washed, starched and pressed already before being carefully laid across the back of a brocade-covered chair. Well, at least they were efficient here. And they ought to be, Harriet thought grimly; with more than a hundred servants running about, each trained to do but one particular task. Even at informal meals there was a servant stationed behind the chair of each guest, ready to spring forward if necessary. She thought it a ridiculous waste of government funds, but of course the governors of a British crown colony were supposed to keep up certain standards of style and elegance, and the ball tonight, she hoped, would prove an example of both.
Alexa stirred and mumbled in her sleep, burrowing her face against the pillow she hugged so fiercely. What a child she could be sometimes, while at others…But it was high time the girl woke up and took some nourishment. Why, her hair alone would require hours of careful detangling and brushing out before it was ready to be styled. Bending down, Harriet shook the sleeping girl’s shoulder firmly.
“Alexa! Out of bed with you quickly, before they bring up the breakfast I ordered for you. Please have the good taste to wear a nightgown and that pretty wrapper your mama had made for you. And it’s no use your pretending you’re still too fast asleep to hear me, either. Up this instant, my girl!”
Recognizing, even in her drowsy state, a certain note in her aunt’s voice that meant she would brook no more procrastination, Alexa sat up at last, still yawning and rubbing at her eyes. She had been dreaming of something quite pleasant, and now she could not remember what it was. Why did she have to wake up so early? Sullenly, she found herself almost forced out of bed while Harriet moved her this way and that like a rag doll, scolding all the while.
“You know very well that too much sleep always spoils your disposition! Here, slip your arms into the sleeves, and I’ll tie the sash for you since you seem incapable of making the slightest effort on your own. Mrs. Mackenzie offered me a personal maid to take care of you, but I had to refuse, of course, because of your immodest habit of walking around your room with nothing or hardly anything on. And you must understand, my dear, that even though we have allowed you a certain amount of freedom at home, other people will hardly understand or condone such pagan habits. Why, not even husbands and wives…” Harriet bit off her words sharply but not soon enough, for Alexa had thrown back her head and was regarding her curiously.
“Do you really mean that people who are married and have children, perhaps, do not see each other without their clothes on? Why, I think that not being naked and free together is the more barbarous custom. And…” But now it was Alexa’s turn to cut short her indignant flow of words and blush as the one memory she had sworn to put completely out of her mind came back with startling, unpleasant clarity.
“I should think you’d have the grace to blush!” Harriet snorted. “And I certainly hope you will never dare attempt to air those views in polite company! I suppose it’s because you spend too much time talking to those coolie women who walk around half-naked themselves. I should have gone along with your mother, and had your papa forbid you…but then…” Harriet suddenly sighed heavily. “I have never believed that females should be kept overly protected and ignorant either, and that is why I have been so free in my discussions with you and have allowed you to read certain books which although they are considered literature are also thought to be not fit for ladies to read.”
“Aunt Harry, I…”
“I do hope, my dear Alexa, that I have not been wrong to bring you up in the way I did. You are eighteen today and still more than half-child, in some ways, but I always wanted your eyes to be open when you became a woman.”
Alexa threw her arms around her aunt, hugging her fiercely. “Please don’t, Aunt Harry! I’m so glad and so lucky that I was brought up by you as I have been, with my eyes open. And in spite of the silly tantrums I throw sometimes and the angry things I say, you must believe that I will never let you down; especially not in public. I feel so sorry for those poor women who know nothing at all beyond how to sketch or paint with watercolors or play a tune on the pianoforte, and cannot even carry on an intelligent conversation with men on politics or hunting or horses…”
At this Harriet had to repress a smile, although she said with her usual brusqueness: “Well, I do hope you will speak with a little less frankness than usual on the topic of horse breeding and refrain from joining in arguments that concern politics or religion. And now get on with you and wash your face with some cold water. Your eyes are quite puffy from oversleeping.”
While Harriet bustled about the room Alexa’s muffled voice came from behind the lacquered screen that hid the washstand with its china pitcher and basin. “I promise that I will be charming to everyone tonight, even the bores, and that I will be decorous and demure and seem helpless and even a little silly, since that is what’s expected of a proper young lady.” She emerged toweling her hair, with those strange slate-colored eyes of hers sparkling in a way that Harriet mistrusted. “In fact, do you think I will find a ‘catch’? It might be an interesting experience to have a suitor, even if I might not decide to marry him in the end. But I suppose I really must learn how to be a flirt, even if it is only to find out if I can turn men into my slaves or not.”
“Alexandra!” Harriet’s voice carried a warning note, but Alexa only laughed, making a turban of her towel as she twisted before one of the full-length mirrors so that her silk skirts swirled about her long legs.
“Oh, but you must not worry that I shall do something to disgrace you. For since I have, thanks to you, dearest aunt, a passably good mind, I have decided to follow your advice and use my feminine wiles to the greatest advantage possible.” She was studying herself in the mirror as she spoke, especially her face. She looked so different with all her hair tucked out of sight. Was it possible that she could ever pass as a man? And then, sighing, Alexa decided not, putting aside one more childhood ambition of hers.
“Well? Trying to decide if your face is your fortune?” Despite her dry tone of voice, Harriet had come up to stand behind Alexa, watching, with a strange tug to her heart, the changing play of expression on the girl’s face as she stared at herself.
“I suppose I’ll never be a raging beauty, will I?” Alexa said diffidently. “Not one of the fashionable kind, anyway, with tiny rosebud mouths that simper instead of smile and faces like pink and white china dolls that don’t show feeling…”
“Sometimes it’s just as well not to show one’s feelings too openly,” Harriet said quietly, but Alexa was too caught up in her game of self-assessment to pay more than token attention.
“Oh, I think I know better than that, of course. But now you must please tell me frankly if my nose is too short—and too thin as well? And my eyebrows—how I wish they were more arched than straight. And…you see how they actually slant a little bit at the temples? But I suppose there is nothing very much I can do about all my defects, including the fact that dark eyes are hardly in fashion at the moment; unless I can manage to make myself all the rage by making every man think I am fascinating!”
“Well…” Harriet cocked her head to one side, studying Alexa’s eager face almost as critically as the girl herself had done, before she said judiciously: “At least you have quite an arresting face, my dear, which I consider the next best thing to being thought fascinating. You have white, even teeth and an attractive smile when you do smile, as well as nice high cheekbones and unusual hair-coloring…and that is quite enough, I think, since I do not on any account want to turn your head.”
“Oh, you could never do that, but you have paid me the greatest compliment in the world by telling me that I have an arresting face. Do I really? Perhaps I need not feel quite so nervous now that you have told me that. And at least I do not freckle under the sun. But…”
“Enough!” Harriet said sternly. “I want you to sit down and eat all of your breakfast before it gets too cold; and at once! There’s a lot to be done before we get you quite ready to be the belle of the ball tonight, my dear.”
“Belle of the ball” indeed. For all of her surface bravado, Alexa could not help the feelings of uncertainty and something akin to fear that stayed with her, making her wish fervently to be anywhere else but here, on exhibition before scores of watching, curious, critical eyes. But she wasn’t a coward, she told herself over and over again. And even if this ordeal seemed worse than facing a charging bull elephant, well, it would be over eventually, and until then all she had to do was to act. Pretend that she was someone else much older and much more experienced who was used to making slaves of men, that was all.
Pretend—an amusing game like “charades.” What role would she play? Cinderella? Cleopatra? Diane de Poitiers? Or innocent Little Red Riding Hood? Her hands felt clammy as she stood in front of the mirror as rigid as a statue while Harriet gave orders to four chattering “sewing women” who had been summoned to make last minute alterations to her ball gown. It had taken at least two hours to subdue her unruly curls into a fashionably sleek coiffure—looped braids on either side of a prim middle-parting threaded with pearl encrusted gold ribbons—a matching “ferronière” around her forehead.
Faint strains of music drifted up through the open windows, and Alexa could not help whispering, “We are not late, are we?” while Harriet was still trying to decide on what jewelry she should wear. From the case she had brought along with her Harriet produced several items, now holding them against Alexa’s bare throat and then discarding them.
“Not suitable…too opulent…not sapphires with a gold and white gown…” And then, irritably, “Of course we are not late! The musicians are merely tuning their instruments, that is all. As if I would allow you to be late!”
With a sigh of resignation Alexa returned to studying her mirrored image once more, hardly caring by now if she wore any jewelry or not, for the fairy-princess gown her dearest Uncle John had magically produced for her seemed more than enough to help her feel like an enchanted princess tonight. Arresting. Would they really think she was arresting? The very latest fashion in Europe, Uncle John had assured her with a twinkle in his bright blue eyes. And it had been especially created for her by the leading designer in Paris—all in white and gold—white silk overskirt delicately sprigged with gold fleur de lys opening at the point where her tightly fitting basque dipped into a vee to reveal shimmering cloth-of-gold—a gossamer-delicate fabric that Sir John had obtained in India. Rows and rows of tiny ruffles all about the full skirts, which almost swept the floor, and matched those accenting a bateau neckline that left most of her shoulders bare while allowing her short, tight sleeves to barely peep out beneath. And there were knots of gold ribbon to further ornament her overskirt as well, and gold satin dancing slippers…
“Here! I think I’ve found just the right thing at last. This pretty and unusually designed gold necklace of your mother’s that matches the bracelet she gave you on your seventeenth birthday. Exactly right. Alexa, you are not wearing your bracelet, and I know that I reminded you to do so just before we left. Surely you cannot have lost it, especially when you know how much it meant to your mama! Please try to think where you might have left it. I could have sworn I noticed you wearing it yesterday. Oh dear—this room is in such a state of confusion…”
Harriet, preoccupied and edgy, did not notice how white Alexa had suddenly become in spite of the red rose petals that had been vigorously rubbed along her cheekbones to give them a glow. Her bracelet! She never took it off, and she clearly remembered seeing it reflected in the moonlight before her whole night had been spoiled by something she’d much rather not remember. But when could it have fallen off?
“Well? For heaven’s sake, do try to remember. It’s almost time we should be downstairs to join the Governor and Mrs. Mackenzie when they begin to receive their guests.”
Alexa found her voice with difficulty. “I know it is somewhere here, Aunt Harry. I think I took it off before I had my bath, and…but how can I remember now? I promise to find it later—I know I shall—but not now when I can hardly think and it is almost time…”
To her relief she heard her aunt snap: “Oh bother! I suppose you are right and we do have to hurry just now. Here, let me tie this gold ribbon around your wrist to make do for the moment. And now turn around…” As Alexa moved automatically, almost like a puppet, Harriet contemplated her critically before saying, “Well, so you are finally ready, I suppose. Here, take your silk shawl just in case you might need it later—and do remember to hold your head up!”
There was nothing to be nervous of. She must remember what Sir John had told her earlier. Courage. Once you faced what you had thought of as an obstacle as squarely as you would face a challenge, it would never seem insurmountable. And yet, as Alexa descended the stairs with her aunt, everything about her seemed to have become hazy and unreal, like a blurred scene watched through a gauze curtain. Her skirts, with the starched and stiffened petticoats she had been made to wear underneath them, seemed heavy and cumbersomely wide as well as being hot. She held on to the polished wood banisters and saw, looking down, the flashes of gold made by her pretty dancing slippers.
“How lovely you look, my dear, and what a beautiful ball gown! They’re all going to envy you; and you’re not to mind, d’you hear?”
Alexa barely remembered to curtsy her thanks to the Governor’s lady for her generous compliment.
“You look just as exquisitely beautiful as I knew you would when I first pictured you in this dress, Alexa.” Sir John kissed her cold cheek lightly as he gave her icy hands a reassuring squeeze and whispered, “And remember, you have a mind that matches your beauty; so be sure of yourself, as you have every reason to be.”
Alexa found that even helping to receive the seemingly endless number of guests that had been invited to the ball this evening did not make her feel awkward with Sir John standing next to her; and by the time they had all sat down to dinner she had already begun to feel a little more self-confident. Course followed course; but all she had to do was push the food around on her plate after she had taken a bite or so and then that particular course would soon be cleared away to make way for another.
As the guest of honor, Alexa found herself seated to the right of the Governor himself; but since Sir John was seated on her right, she managed quite comfortably. In fact, she found that the Right Honorable James Alexander Stewart Mackenzie was a kind man in addition to having fathered seven children (all away at school in England), which she felt made him all the more understanding. Not only that, but he was quite a scholar; being particularly learned in Latin and delighted at her knowledge of the language, as well as the literature of ancient Rome.
In time, Alexa’s smiles became genuine instead of forced, so that her dimple showed. Studying her while she listened and laughed over some dry anecdote the Governor related, Sir John Travers reflected that it was in some ways a pity she did not realize how attractive she was—this child-woman he had watched grow up. Had she lived in Europe she could have become all the rage; but with a little more experience and polish, of course. There was the almost unique color of her hair, with its variety of shadings; and the startling contrast of those slate-dark eyes against a pale gold skin of the kind that welcomed the sun instead of having to hide from it. She had the supple, athletic figure of a young Amazon as well, and it was a pity that women’s clothes these days were meant to disguise and conceal every natural curve and line of the feminine body. In fact, the thought that his little Alexa’s free, bold spirit would some day be caged and confined by the stays and corsets of convention and what was supposed to be fashionable was almost intolerable. But perhaps he could do something about it? A challenge, that was what he needed at this point in his life, when all of the vast fortune he had accumulated over the years merely for the fun and adventure of it could not buy him health or happiness or an extension on life itself. A challenge…stimulation…a rescue? And why not? Ah yes, why not indeed?
“Uncle John? I’ve been chattering my head off for the past few minutes, practicing on you, as you said I should do. But you haven’t heard a single word, have you? Did I sound too vapid and inane? Or just too boring to be worth your attention?”
Alexa’s reproachful voice made Sir John chuckle as he patted her arm and said, “Not at all, my dear! Just had a lot on my mind, that’s all; and some of my thoughts concerned you, as a matter of fact. But I see Mrs. Mackenzie giving the signal for all you ladies to retire; so we’ll talk about it later, shall we?”
There was a rustling of long skirts and the scrape of chairs as all the ladies rose in concert to follow the Governor’s wife; and Alexa, reluctantly, had no choice but to do likewise.
As they walked out Mrs. Mackenzie made a point of holding Alexa back for a few moments; her smile kind and almost conspiratorial.
“I just wanted to tell you, my dear, that you’re doing very well indeed, and you mustn’t let being thrown in with a crowd of women intimidate you. Makes me remember my own coming out ball, y’know! I was as nervous inside as you must be, but I didn’t let them see it either. And—ah yes—what I really started out to say was that I don’t want you to think there will be a lack of young men to dance with later on. The dinner was for the pillars of society here, if you know what I mean, but once the dancing begins I’m sure they’ll flock around you like flies—all our eligible young officers and Civil Servants. And we’re to have distinguished guests from at least two of the foreign ships anchored at Colombo Roadstead as well—at least one British title among them! We had some of them to dinner last night; a pity you were too tired to join us. But I see all the ladies watching us curiously, and the last thing I meant to do was to make you feel conspicuous. I only meant to tell you, my dear, that I like you because I can tell you’ve got spirit; and that I want you to enjoy yourself tonight. You’re only young once, after all, and why not?”
Having delivered her speech in a rapid undertone, Mrs. Mackenzie swept a somewhat dazed Alexa ahead of her into the drawing room, where she found herself seated between the Governor’s wife and a milky-faced blonde of about her age who was gowned in ruffles and flounces from her hem to her neck and down again to her elbow-length sleeves.
Charlotte Langford had attended an Academy for Young Ladies in England before her formidable mother had decided that it was time she found herself a suitable husband. And here in Ceylon, where there were not very many blond and blue-eyed young English girls to be seen, she could have her choice of the most eligible bachelors—as long as her mama approved, of course.
Her mama had very decided opinions on everything, and Charlotte had always been guided by her; but in the case of Miss Howard she had not been quite as forthright as she usually was.
“Now remember, Charlotte, that if you are introduced to her I will expect you to keep a detached and Christian viewpoint. You know what I mean?”
“Oh yes! Of course, Mama!”
“Good! And I am trusting, of course, in the way in which you have been brought up and the education you have received back home. It will disappoint me if you should show any signs of being patronizing towards a young woman who has not been fortunate enough to have gone back to England since her birth, poor child. And as for the kind of schooling she might have received, I have no idea of it. But if Sir John Travers is sponsoring her it must mean, I suppose, that at least she is presentable enough…”
“Yes, Mama. But I am afraid I do not quite understand if I am to make friends with Miss Howard or…or not.”
“Oh heavens, Charlotte! Don’t you listen to anything I tell you? If she has been accepted by the Governor and his wife as well as Sir John, I see no reason why you should not make her acquaintance at least. And I’m sure that I can trust you not to…well, not to be influenced in any way your papa and I might not approve of; and to find out for yourself if Miss Howard might prove to be a suitable friend or not.”
“Oh yes, Mama!”
Charlotte had found out long ago that it made life much more pleasant to say “yes” to Mama. Even Papa did so, and he was a colonel and used to giving orders. But now that she was seated right next to Miss Howard, what would Mama expect her to do? The seemingly self-possessed and fashionably gowned young woman who had been able to carry on an animated conversation with Sir John Travers and Governor Mackenzie could surely not be the same person who, according to the gossip that filtered down from upcountry, went riding dressed like a man and hunted wild game in the company of the young officers stationed nearby her father’s coffee plantation without the benefit of a chaperone? Used to her mama’s close guidance in everything, Charlotte could not help but feel rather nervous at being left on her own, so to speak. She was not used to anything or anyone out of the ordinary and had no notion of how to deal with Miss Howard and keep her mama happy at the same time, although she had to admit to a certain degree of curiosity….
Suddenly, taking Charlotte quite aback, Alexa turned to her with a bright smile that Charlotte could not know was pasted on.
“I’m so sorry if I have appeared rude! But this is my first experience of such a formal gathering, and I have not yet discovered what is considered correct and what is not—so I hope you’ll forgive me for introducing myself to you, since nobody else has troubled to do so. I am Alexandra Howard, and you…?”
Charlotte’s mouth had dropped open with surprise at such an unexpected and unconventionally forthright approach, and she could not help but dart an almost desperately appealing look in her mama’s direction before she managed to stammer: “I…Oh, I do hope you will not think…Since we are seated next to each other I should perhaps have made an effort…. I am Miss Langford, you see. Colonel Jack Langford is my father, and that is my mama across the room. I had been quite looking forward to making your acquaintance, Miss Howard, since we have all heard so much about you.”
“Have you? What have you heard about me?” Under straight dark brows Alexa’s storm-cloud eyes gazed with uncompromising directness into Charlotte Langford’s reddening face, never wavering while Charlotte began to stammer awkwardly again, her cheeks looking positively blotchy by now.
“I hope you did not think I meant…All the young officers who have been transferred here from upcountry are always so full of admiration for your courage and…and daring, you see, and of how well you ride and shoot…”
“How nice of them to be so flattering!” Alexa said in a noncommittal voice, discovering nastily that Miss Langford had particularly ugly teeth that looked yellow, and watery blue eyes that kept dropping before hers. How she hated gossip and gossips!
“They are actually staying with Uncle John—in his guest house! He is a good friend of her papa’s, Miss Langford informed me condescendingly. And I’m sorry, Aunt Harriet, but although I did manage to remain polite, I cannot like her. You should have noticed the way she kept glancing towards her mama for approval every second we were engaged in conversation; and in any case she has no intelligent conversation at all. All she does is quote her mama or pretend to pity me because I was never packed off to school in England as she was.”
Alexa had for once been relieved to catch her aunt’s imperative eyes and follow her dutifully upstairs to their rooms when Mrs. Mackenzie had kindly suggested that some of the ladies might wish to make use of some of the retiring rooms that had been set aside for them before the dancing began.
“You are going to appear fresh and sparkling when we go downstairs again, my dear,” Harriet had said firmly. “Some more of that rose cologne on your wrists and temples perhaps, but not so much as to be overpowering of course. And perhaps some rose petals rubbed on your lips and just a slight touch of vaseline to give them a slight shine; although you must never tell your mother I suggested such a thing. And let’s shake out your gown at the back…and yes, I noticed you were talking with the Langford girl—Charlotte, I think her name is. It might do you good to have a female friend of about your own age for a change, you know.”
Although Alexa had forced herself to be still and allow Aunt Harriet and the two attendant servant women to do as they pleased with her ever since they had come upstairs, she had found it harder and harder to subdue the rebellious side of her nature that was already simmering under the politely simpering, naive surface she was supposed to present. And then her aunt’s expressed opinion that she might do well to make a friend of Miss Langford had brought all her smouldering feelings of resentment tumbling out into passionate speech.
Her uncompromising brows drawn together in a dangerous scowl she was not even aware of, Alexa paused only long enough to take a long breath before continuing: “And what is more I could never even think of becoming friendly with anyone that silly—who is not capable of carrying on an intelligent conversation and thinks that gossip is a substitute. Why, I doubt that the poor creature has a thought in her head that wasn’t put there by her mama!”
Harriet, realizing the danger signals belatedly, said sharply: “Alexandra! You’d better wipe that ugly look off your face before we go downstairs, my girl, or you’ll be certain to give all the spiteful gossips such as Mrs. Langford the satisfaction of nodding their heads and repeating that you’re obviously unused to being in polite society. And that would be a great pity for all of us who have faith in your strength of character, as well as for yourself, don’t you think?”
Realizing that Aunt Harry had as usual managed to say exactly the right thing by subtly putting her on her honor while showing her a challenge at the same time, Alexa could only fall silent, gritting her teeth with the effort. Even if she could not make friends with Charlotte Langford or any of the other young women she might meet, she could and would show them that she, Alexa Howard, could play any role she chose to play and do much better than they could. Hadn’t she promised herself that she would be a success tonight and make all the nasty old gossips eat their words?
With a sudden whirl of skirts Alexa turned about to face her aunt with her scowl replaced by a brilliant smile.
“Don’t worry, Aunt Harriet. Tonight I promise I’ll make you all proud of me; and I won’t lose my temper either, no matter how provoked I feel. And what’s more I’ll be polite to everyone, even those people I don’t like; and I won’t appear too intelligent for their liking either. In fact they’re all going to end up saying what a well-brought-up young lady I am—you’ll see!”
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