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"Well maybe."
"Hey, that's marvellous! I thought no one in the village wanted to
work here."
"No well, there was this rumour, you see, that your father was going
to sell Devil's Mount. The village people resented that."
"Oh." William nodded. Then he grunted. "I bet I know who was
responsible for starting that."
"Yes, well, I don't want to hear about it. The fact remains that if your
father isn't going to sell the house, then I'm sure no one in the village
would object to working here."
"Super!" William sounded delighted. "Then Nerys'll have even less
reason for complaining about the conditions here." He sighed
suddenly. "Not that that's such a good thing, of course. I don't want
her to settle here."
"Now, William..."
"Well, it's true." Then he shrugged his momentary gloom away. "Oh,
but that is good news about someone else working here, isn't it?"
Then his brow creased again. "But I don't understand. Why was my
father angry about it?"
Julie turned away, fidgeting with the cosmetic jars on the marble
surface of the washstand. "He I expect he objected to my
interfering without his permission."
"Is that what he said?"
Julie crossed her fingers. "More or less."
"Huh!" William's toe thudded into the door jamb, and Julie turned
reprovingly.
"Don't do that, William." She Sighed. "Now, if you don't mind, I have
rather a headache.. .."
"But what about tea?" William's cry was plaintive, but for once Julie
could not respond to it.
"I'm sorry, but I don't think I could drink any tea right now," she said.
"Let me lie down for a while, and I'll probably be all right by dinner
time."
William was clearly torn between his desire to protest and an
awareness that if he argued, Julie might not come down to dinner
either.
"Oh, all right," he said at last. "I suppose I'll have to have it alone."
"Why don't you have it in the kitchen? With Mrs. Evans?" suggested
Julie. "Ner your aunt is with your father just now."
William nodded. "I know, I saw her go in. Nosy creature! As soon as
Dulcie told her I'd been sent out of the room, she came to see what
was going on."
Julie acknowledged this with an inclination of her head. So Nerys had
been protecting her property after all. Well, who could blame her?
Julie took some aspirin for the very real headache which had followed
her confrontation with Rhys, and after resting for a while, felt
reasonably well enough to take a bath. She had towelled herself, and
was sitting in her dressing gown brushing her hair before the mirror
when there was a knock at her door. Thinking it must be William
again, come to assure himself that she was recovered, she called:
"Come in!" and then felt a frisson of alarm slide up her spine when
Nerys came into the room.
She was dressed for the evening in a gorgeous gown of dark red
velvet, low-necked and long-sleeved, with bands of silver fur edging
the cuffs and hem. If she had set out deliberately to make Julie feel
inferior, she had succeeded, and the fleeting glimpse Julie had of her
own reflection as Nerys closed the door made her defeatedly aware of
her red-rimmed eyes and pale cheeks. She didn't know why Nerys
had come to see her, although she guessed it was not dissociated from
what the older girl had witnessed that afternoon, but she didn't see
what'she could say about something so obviously unimportant.
"William told me you had a headache." Nerys glanced rather
haughtily round the room. "Are you feeling better?"
' Julie guessed that if Nerys had acquired that information, it was
more likely through Dulcie than William. But even so, she would not
have expected her to care, one way or the other.
"Thank you, it's almost gone," she answered politely.
"Oh, good." Nerys allowed a faint smile to touch her rather thin lips.
"I can stand anything but a headache."
Julie acknowledged this with an inclination of her head, and waited
for her to go on. Her incapacity could not be the whole reason for
Nerys invading her room like this, and the earlier prick of alarm
heightened into actual apprehension.
"Actually, Miss Wood, I wanted to talk to you woman to woman, so
to speak." She paused. "But this is rather difficult for me..."
Julie took a deep breath. "If it's about this afternoon, Lady Llantreath,
then please don't say anything. What you saw what you thought
you saw meant nothing, nothing at all!"
"I know that, you silly girl!" Nerys showed her teeth, but it was hardly
a smile. "I should know Rhys' little foibles by now. He can't resist a
pretty face, particularly one that makes it so obvious that it wouldn't
object!"
Julie gulped. "What do you "
"Oh, please, Miss Wood, spare me the dramatics! I'm a woman, too,
you know, and far more experienced in the ways of the world than
you will ever be, believe me. No, your er association with
my with Rhys doesn't really come into this. Except only indirectly."
Julie got to her feet. "Will you please come to the point, Lady
Llantreath. I have to get dressed for dinner."
Nerys' lips tightened. "Very well. I understand you have been
interfering in the running of Devil's Mount, that you have actually
taken it upon yourself to employ some girl from the village."
"Not exactly & "
"Well, whatever." Nerys' nails plucked impatiently at her long skirt.
"Are you aware that I only agreed to come here on the understanding
that once Rhys' book was completed, we would move back to
London?"
"I don't see what this has to do with me "
"Don't you? Don't you?" Nerys took an involuntary step forward, her
eyes glittering angrily. "Then I'll explain. Having gossiped about our
affairs in the village, you then boast about your success to William,
filling him with the false belief that Devil's Mount is to remain his
home "
"But it is!"
"You don't know that."
"But Rhys Mr. Edwards said "
"What Rhys says and what he does are two different things. Once this
desire for.literary acclaim has left him, he'll find life at Devil's Mount
a very boring affair. He's a man of the world, Miss Wood, not one of
your boorish generation, who seem to find destruction so much more
satisfying than making a success of their lives. He craves adventure
and excitement you must know that. What can a village on the
Cambrian coast mean to him?"
"I still don't see why you're telling me all this."
"Do you not? No, well, perhaps I haven't made the whole position
very clear yet. William, Miss Wood, is the cross I have to bear, and
you're making it that much more difficult."
"But how?"
"You know that boy, Miss Wood. You know what he can do, how he
can inveigle his own way by those imaginary attacks "
"They're not imaginary attacks!"
"Never mind what they are. He can bring them on to order. And with
you behind him ..." She broke off abruptly. 'T want you to leave
Devil's Mount, Miss Wood. You're not a good influence here."
Julie's expression was ludicrous. "You can't be serious!"
"I'm afraid I am."
"But but I don't want to leave." Julie gazed at her incredulously.
"I Mr. Edwards hired me. I'll leave when he asks me to, and not
before."
Nerys' lips twisted. "I thought you say that."
"Then you weren't disappointed, were you?"
Julie's courage strengthened as she said the words. What could Nerys
do, after all? She hadn't the authority to turn her out, and somehow
she still believed what Rhys had said about not giving her notice. And
there was William. ...
Nerys sighed now, folding her arms, her fingers beating an impatient
tattoo against her sleeve. "Nevertheless," she said, "I think you will
leave, Miss Wood. If you don't, I shall have no choice but to tell
William that Dulcie is not his cousin, but his sister."
CHAPTER ELEVEN [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]