Bride's Dilemma Read online

  “This is my wife, Joe,” John said, while Tina shivered a little at his side, not with cold but with excitement and apprehension.

  “I’m glad to know you, ma’am.” Joe touched his cap and towered over her, a gentle giant she couldn’t help liking the look of. “I hope yo’ll be mighty happy.”

  “How’s Liza?” John wanted to know.

  “The little missy is fine, boss. And sure keen to see yo’ home agin. She been jumpin’ like a jellybean all dis day and there ain’t 'been no holdin’ her.”

  John laughed, and as though he had to communicate his eagerness to see his daughter he hooked an arm about Tina and gave her a brief hug.

  The motor-launch was attached by a rope to a bollard, the boards sounding under John’s feet as he leapt to them and held out his hands to Tina. He swung her with ease to his side, then he proceeded to stack their baggage as Joe handed it down to him. At last they were ready to set off for home. The launch quivered as the engine leapt to life, and as Joe steered her away from the dock he looked enormous, outlined against the starlight.

  Tina stood alone by the rail as her husband talked to Joe, the sea breezes catching at the ends of her hair and whipping them back from her neck. Overhead the Milky Way was a scarf of glittering sequins, and as Kingston fell away and was lost to sight, the purr of the motor and the burr of deep male voices brought to Tina a transient sense of peace. She was on the last lap of her journey to her new home. Her home. Blue Water House. The dream place she had never expected to see, let alone live in. Her hands locked about the rail in front of her. Less than a fortnight ago she had been travelling from Chorley to London, with no thought in her mind beyond finding herself digs and a job. That was all she had visualized for Tina Manson, the shy young typist who had finally broken the tyranny of a loveless relationship.

  Yet now, right this moment, she was on board a motor-launch that was skimming through Caribbean waters. Furthermore she was married to a charming, disturbing, haunted stranger, embroiled again in a relationship that could prove heart-breaking for her.

  The journey to the island took several hours and John’s cook had packed a food hamper for them They picnicked on deck, eating steak sandwiches washed down by the best coffee Tina had ever tasted.

  “It’s crushed from Blue Mountain berries,” John told her, refilling the cup she held out to him.

  “It’s heavenly coffee.” She held both hands round the cup as she sipped at it. The sweet, strange intimacy of this alfresco meal was something she was locking away in her memory. Right now John was exclusively hers, but too soon would she be sharing him with other people. People who might resent her. Liza, for instance! For eight years her father had belonged solely to her, now she was going to have to share him—with a woman who was a total stranger. A woman he might not love, but one who was his wife, to whom in propinquity he would be bound to turn for the intimacies he was entitled to. Tina gave a little shiver at the thought. He had gone to the rail and he stood there tall, bold featured, the tropical breezes ruffling his hair. The darkness hid the lines in his face and the silver in his hair. As he stood there, half turned away, he might have been again the young husband of Joanna.

  As he stood there, his gaze on the water, was he thinking of Joanna? Must it always be like that—even when he held her in his arms—his thoughts and his heart for Joanna?

  He took out his pipe and his tobacco-pouch, and when in a while the strong but fragrant whorls of smoke came to Tina, she rose and joined him at the rail—for this was her John. The jutting pipe, the crinkly smile—these were hers.

  “The sea smells good,” he murmured. “Do you like it?”

  “Mmmm,” she nodded. “Are the tropical nights always this balmy?”

  “A good deal of the time.” Casually he hooked her to his side, unknowing that in doing so he made the evening heavenly for her. “Some shattering storms do blow up at times, then towards August we have to expect a hurricane or two. But on the whole Ste. Monique is quite a paradise. You're going to like it there. I knew you would back in England, that afternoon on the cliff. Do you remember?”

  She smiled to herself. Would she ever be likely to forget? “Yes, I remember,” she said softly. “When you told me about Ste. Monique I fell in love with it then and there.”

  As though the word “love” intrigued him, he slanted her a downward glance. “You asked me last night, Tina, if I had any regrets regarding our marriage. Have you any?” He hesitated. “I mean, you’re young and presumably of a romantic disposition—it would be understandable if you missed being romantically wooed before being won.”

  “I’m quite satisfied with things as they are,” she assured him. “I wanted to marry you—”

  “Obviously out of loneliness.” There was an understanding tone to his voice. “That is the one big thing we have in common. I wonder if it will lead to other bigger things? Not right now, but eventually, when we’ve grown more used to each other. Do you think it possible?”

  She hoped, fervently, that it was possible.

  “This is how I see the situation,” he went on. “We’ll regard ourselves more or less as an engaged couple and progress towards a deeper relationship, at a pace that need not frighten you. You were frightened last night, weren’t you? You looked at me—when I suggested you go to bed—like a gallant little soldier bracing yourself to leave your bunk hole for no-man’s-land. You tilted your chin, put back your shoulders—my poor child, I knew exactly how you were feeling!”

  No! Oh, no! The denial cried through her. I love you—I wanted you—

  He took her by the shoulders as she tensed to give voice to her feelings. He added, in a hardening toner “We won’t discuss the matter any more. Let things take their course, but if the situation doesn’t work out between us—well, there’s a remedy.”

  A remedy! An annulment, a putting right of the mistake he might have made in marrying her? The voice of her clamoring love was stifled. It sank mute within her. John thought she had married him for the same reason he had married her, and it could only embarrass him and confuse the issue to reveal that she loved him. He was a man of integrity and he would hate hurting her with his lesser feelings. As it was he thought they could build up a workable relationship based on mutual respect and need ... he wouldn’t say that love had died in him the day Joanna’s lifeless body had been brought out of the sea. He didn’t have to say it, he just hunched over the rail and seemed to forget Tina’s presence.

  An hour later they came in sight of the palm trees fringing the beach below Blue Water House, and soon they were edging through a V-shaped channel in the barrier reef. The currents here were at conflict and when the launch struck into them they turned in unison to spit their white fury at its intrusive bows. The coral jagged out of the water like weird branches, but Joe, with a cool nonchalance—there are no finer seamen than these Cayman Islanders—steered a straight, true course to the wide crescent of a beach that was Trecarrel property. The engine cut out as they berthed by the jetty. John sprang out and made fast. Tina, sleepy and bemused, was helped over the side by Joe.

  “Yo’s home, mistress,” he beamed.

  “Welcome to Ste. Monique, Tina,” John added. Then to Joe: “Leave the bulk of the baggage on board until the morning. Just hand me that small case of my wife’s—that’s the one! Thanks, Joe. Now off home with you, or I shall have Topaz scolding me in the morning.”

  Joe’s laughter rang out as John took Tina by the elbow and led her up the beach to a flight of steps cut into the stone of the cliffs. These were lit at intervals by battery-lamps and because the steps were shallow and wide the climb was less tedious than it might otherwise have been. They came out on a headland with a path pointing directly ahead of them. John’s fingers tightened on Tina’s arm.

  “We’re almost home,” he said. “Soon you’ll be tumbling into bed.”

  She gave him a drowsy smile, relieved that they had come home at this hour, when she could escape almost at once to h
er room and not have to meet the members of his household just yet.

  They were evidently approaching the house from the rear, for now they were walking upon stone flags through a dark garden where cicadas throbbed and tree-frogs croaked. The tropical fragrances of the plants almost stunned Tina, while great ghostly moths brushed her hair, sending her closer to John.

  She heard him laugh above her head. “This is like an elopement in reverse, isn’t it?” he said. “Instead of the happy couple sloping off into the night to many, here we are creeping in. That’s what comes of marrying a bohemian sculptor, Tina.”

  “I think it’s rather romantic,” she murmured. “Much more exciting than a prosaic arrival in daylight—”

  "With the servants lined up to greet us, eh?” he broke in dryly.

  “Yes, that too,” she admitted.

  “You baby!” His voice in the darkness had a deep brown sound, so thrilling that Tina was tempted to sway against him and maybe trigger off something—anything. The moment prickled with possibilities, then was lost as lights speared the star-dusted gloom and the bulk of the house loomed into view.

  If Tina had hoped to avoid meeting people tonight, she quickly learned upon entering the house that there were others who were determined to meet her, despite the lateness of the hour, chimed out by a lovely old rosewood clock. As she stood beside John in the hall, confused by its oak-lined grandeur, gracious double staircase, and arcaded niches leading to various rooms, a dignified colored manservant murmured words of welcome, then apologetically informed them that Massa Ralph and his sister were in the salon waiting to welcome them home.

  “Oh, lord!” John pushed a hand over his face. A quizzical brow arched above his left eye as he caught Tina’s startled glance. “I’m sorry, my dear, but it looks as though we have a welcoming committee after all. I can’t spare you the ordeal, I'm afraid. Ralph is my closest friend. And Paula— well, it wouldn’t do to antagonize your nearest feminine neighbor. Let’s get it over!”

  Nathaniel, the butler, went ahead of them and opened with superb dignity a pair of tall, carved doors. He then stood aside for Tina to precede her husband into the salon. She nearly tripped on the thick Turkey carpet and felt color storm into her cheeks as she met the interested gaze of a man with a crinkly, young-old face and thinnish hair. He sat away from the wings of a big chair, then stood up with a quick smile. In another chair a pale arm stretched with a cigarette to an ashtray on a low, carved table. On the long, beautiful hand there was a big pearl ring. Thin but shapely legs clasped in gossamer stockings were the next thing you noticed about Paula Carrish. Tina, who had never pretended to be worldly, knew instinctively that this was a curiously exciting woman who didn’t need a beautiful face in order to attract men. Like her brother she abruptly stood up, rather too tall for a woman, with the hungry figure of a French mannequin, the dark fiery silk of her hair plaited into a coronet that contrasted vividly with thick creamy skin that was untouched by the sun, and long, heavy-lidded, glow-worm green eyes.

  Tina thought of glow-worms because she knew they flickered green in the dark in order to attract the males! Paula Carrish’s eyes had such a flicker between the long, straight lashes that had been thickly darkened with mascara.

  No, not beautiful, but sensationally dangerous in her slinky femininity that must hit most men dead between the eyes!

  Her gliding appraisal took in every aspect of Tina’s appearance as she stood there under the bright flow of light from one of the chandeliers. With a cruel clarity it revealed the weary crescents beneath Tina’s eyes, the nervous way she clenched her bottom lip with childish teeth, the uncertainty with which she entered this great, grand house as its new mistress.

  The tension was lifted slightly as the two men clapped their hands together in a hearty handshake. “This is Tina,” John said, lightly, no underlining note of pride in his voice. “Tina, meet Ralph, whom you’ll be seeing a lot of in future.”

  Her hand was gripped, hazel-green eyes smiled down warmly upon her. “I’m glad to know you, Tina.” He spoke with genuine friendliness, a much less complicated person than his sister appeared to be.

  Tina’s eyes met Paula’s, and she decided that this cousin of Joanna’s was a remarkably good actress, for not a quiver of inward hostility was echoed in her voice or betrayed by the flicker of a mascarad eyelash as she drawled at John: “You sly dog! When we received your cable we half wondered if you were having us on.”

  “Well, now you have the evidence to prove I wasn’t.” He touched Tina’s shoulder and there seemed to be an edge of derision to his smile when he suggested that Ralph pour out drinks.

  “Yes, we must drink to the occasion,” Ralph agreed with enthusiasm. “Now why couldn’t I have had your luck while I was on leave? All I seemed to get tangled up with were party-type girls.”

  “Bachelors are always more adept at preserving their freedom than widowers, my pet.” Paula had a seductive tendency to swallow her r’s, Tina noticed, watching as John held a table-lighter to the cigarette the tapering fingers plucked out of a silver box. Then she put back her rich sienna head and let smoke trickle from her nostrils, staring all the while at John. He returned her stare, and Tina wondered in that moment what incredible motive had led him to punish Paula by marrying someone as nondescript as herself. Love had not motivated his choice. But could it be that he was getting back at Paula ... who had been with Joanna when she had fallen over the side of that yacht!

  “Sit down, Tina.” John gestured rather impatiently towards a winged chair, where she sat on the edge, her eyes dark with her disturbing thoughts. Who could tell what anyone might be capable of, in the grip of a strong love, which could also hold elements of hatred ...

  Then, catching John’s frowning glance, Tina shifted into the depths of her chair and tried to relax. She was overwrought from their long journey and imagining an emotional undertow that might not exist at all. She fixed her attention on the salon, octagonal in shape with long windows under recessed, shell-edged arches, the curtains glimmering deeply blue against the honey-toned panelling. The wide, Ionic columned fireplace was decorative rather than functional in a climate that was sub-tropical most of the year, while mirror and picture frames were gilded and scrolled like the high ceiling. The furnishings and general setup of the room were of the Colonial era, which nonetheless imparted an air of serenity that Tina welcomed—and needed.

  “I’ve made it cognacs,” Ralph said, bringing over a circular tray with balloon glasses on it. When each of them held a drink, he added with deep sincerity: “All the best, you two!”

  His sister drawled: “Here’s hoping you’ll both be happy!”

  Tina sank her nose into her glass after a swift glance at John, who was cradling his drink in lean hands and looking enigmatical. He had heard it as well, the way Paula had stressed the word “hoping.” Tina was beginning to know that blank look of his, which meant he was shutting himself in with his private thoughts and feelings—shutting her out!

  “You paid a visit to Devon, I suppose, John?” Paula queried.

  “No, I didn’t get as far as the West Country,” he replied.

  “Tina speaks like a country girl,” curious green eyes flickered over his unreadable face. “I thought perhaps—”

  “Tina’s from Sussex.”

  “That’s rather a nice part of England,” Ralph put in. “Did you live near the sea, Tina?”

  “Like in the well-known song,” Paula drawled, smiling and lounging on the arm of a chair, more openly dangerous now—perhaps because John’s hair was still attractively sea-ruffled, his eyes faintly drowsy, the dark grey of his suit aiding and abetting his lean air of distinction. A man you wanted, Tina thought, clutched by the throat when for a moment his blue eyes dwelt on her, deep in her winged chair, moon-pale against the wine upholstery.

  “Yes, I lived near the sea.” She glanced quickly away from her husband and met the quiet safety of Ralph’s smile. Expressions of mutual approval lit their e
yes, and it occurred to Tina that she and this man would have made a much more satisfactory brother and sister than he and Paula made.

  “Good,” he grinned. “We must fix up a swimming date.”

  “You’d better watch out, John,” Paula laughed silkily. “These two appear to be forming a mutual admiration club.”

  “I think I can trust Ralph,” John retorted, and then he swung to face the double doors of the salon as they burst open to admit a pyjama-clad, tousle-haired child. “Liza!” John quickly set aside his brandy glass as the child came racing towards him. He swept her up in his arms, and Tina coveted the deep, warm note of love in his voice, the way he hugged the little girl as though he wanted to break her.

  “Pops! Oh, Pops!” She nuzzled his face and wrapped her arms about his neck. “Ooh, I've missed you!”

  “I’ve missed you, my baby, like the very devil!” He soundly kissed his young daughter. “You really should have been asleep hours ago, you young witch,” he crooned.

  “I couldn’t sleep—I’ve been dying to see you! Oh, Pops,” tears thickened her voice, “I’m so glad you're home!”

  “Me too, honey. I’ve been longing to get back home to you, but there’s been so much happening. What did you think of my news ?”

  She mumbled something, and with a faintly quizzical grin he turned round still holding the child. Across the room his eyes met Tina’s. She had risen from her chair, feeling at a disadvantage because she had hoped to meet Liza when she and John were alone with the child. With Paula looking on, her eyes narrowed into those curious, flickering slits of green, an odd air of excitement about her as though she secretly hoped that Liza was going to be antagonistic, Tina lost her poise. She looked as shy and uncertain as the little girl, whom John now lowered to her bare feet and brought over towards his young wife.