Greek Wedding (32 page)

‘Of course.' He clapped his hands and servants hurried in with a huge wooden platter piled high with fresh fruit and a dish of the cakes of nut and honey she knew so well. More wine was poured, though she had already had quite as much as she wanted. ‘You must try this.' Alex ignored her protests. ‘It's something quite special of our own.' His eyes glittered in the torch-light. Jenny would say this was a scene straight out of Sir Walter Scott. What a world away Jenny seemed…

There was coffee at last, and tiny glasses of ouzo, which Phyllida managed to refuse. ‘Alex—' She did not like the note of uncertainty in her own voice. ‘Don't you think Peter might have waked by now?'

‘Ah, Peter.' He nodded to the group of men who had sat a little away from them at the big table, and they rose and left the room. ‘My Brother Peter.' She felt Brett, beyond him, tense at something strange in his tone.

‘Yes. It's time I went to him.'

‘A devoted sister.' Stranger and stranger. ‘He wasn't sure you'd come. I knew you would. And you, milord. You've won me a pair of pistols, the two of you.'

‘Where
is
Peter?' Phyllida knew that quiet tone of Brett's.

‘That's the question, isn't it? Let me think. Four hours—more like five since we left the harbour. I should think they're well out to sea by now.'

‘What in the world do you mean?' She was afraid to understand.

‘I wonder if the others will have been as easily fooled as you.' He drank, and smiled at her over the glass. ‘Such a good sister. But so is Jenny. I'm sure, when Peter arrived with his tale of treachery, she will have been quite as quick to act as you.'

‘Treachery,' said Brett.

It felt cold in the hall, and darker. ‘Peter's not here,' said Phyllida. ‘He's not hurt at all.'

‘Of course not. Aren't you relieved,
kyria
?'

Shock and anger held her dumb. Yes, and fear. Fear admitted at last, that secret dread of hers that had haunted her ever since they left Nauplia. It all came, horribly, clear now. The night Peter proposed to Jenny: she had thought, oddly, that Alex was pleased at the result. No wonder! It had ensured Peter's cooperation in his plans against the
Helena
… Plans, she saw now, that went further back, the further she looked. He had saved them, that day at Spetsai, because he wanted the
Helena
himself. But then, she felt herself redden with rage and shame, he had thought he might get her and her fortune as well, and had held his hand. When she refused him, he had begun to plot again, had suggested that they leave Nauplia and hide in his ‘safe' anchorage under Sunion. She had saved them, for the moment, when she refused to go, but now…

‘Kidnapped.' Something wonderfully steadying about Brett's tone as he summed it up. And then, across Alex, to her: ‘At least, Phyllida, we were both fooled equally.' He turned back to Alex. ‘So. You've got us here. No need to discuss the means. What we need to know is the end.'

The calm tone that steadied Phyllida was acting as an irritant on Alex. In his imagination, this scene had played itself quite differently. He poured more ouzo with a hand that was not quite steady. ‘The end? Why, two marriages; two splendid settlements, and, from you, milord, a ransom that will enable me to make this castle fit for my American wife.'

‘But—'

Brett's glance silenced Phyllida. If Alex thought him rich enough to pay an immense ransom should he be disillusioned? ‘Let me understand you,' he went on, still in that tone of dangerous quiet. ‘Peter has boarded the
Helena
, you're telling us, with one of your lying stories—and done what?'

‘Taken her to a place of safety, of course. Down by Matapan, to await my instructions about your ransom and our double wedding. He'll have told them, you see, that unless they do as he bids, you two will be killed.'

‘Ingenious,' said Brett. Pure nightmare, this matter-of-fact conversation. ‘And will we?'

‘Oh, I don't think that will be necessary. A few weeks as my guests—I hope you won't mind the upper stories of the tower?—while we make the arrangements. Peter will need your power of attorney,
kyria;
a letter to that man of business of yours on Zante. And you, milord, will have to write your friends in England. That will take rather longer, of course, but once Phyllida and I are safely married, I think we will be able to accept your word of honour and treat you as our guest.'

Once again, Brett's glance silenced Phyllida. ‘And Jenny?'

‘I told you.' Impatiently. ‘A double wedding. I have Peter's promise that he'll wait. Well, of course… He needs his fortune—and hers.'

‘And you trust him?'

‘We're brothers.' His tone betrayed him. This was his weak point. ‘Besides'—he turned a travesty of the old smile on Phyllida—‘he knows that he is entirely dependent on my wife's goodwill. And therefore on mine. You need have no fear for your sister, milord.'

‘No?' Once again, Brett's calmly ironic tone forestalled an outburst from Phyllida. He was trying to convey something to her, now that Alex had turned half away from him to speak directly to her. ‘Time.' Was that the word his lips were forming? Play for time?

Why? Well, why not? Lost in a sea of emotion, rage with herself, with Alex … black anxiety for Jenny … feelings beyond endurance about Peter … she was in no state to think. If Brett had some idea, some shred of a plan, she would be only too glad to go along with it.

‘Alex.' It hurt her to use his name. ‘I can't believe it. I can't take it in.' Behind him, Brett's look was approving. ‘I'm ill.' She put a shaking hand to her head. It was nearly enough true. ‘That ride … And now this … I don't understand—anything… I think I'm going to faint—' At what point in the incredible conversation had they all risen to their feet? She swayed now, and made herself clutch Alex for support.

He was suddenly, horribly, all solicitude, a tender arm round her. And beyond him, Brett's glance, approving, supporting her. ‘So you're human after all,
kyria
.' Alex, too, sounded approving. ‘I confess, I'd wondered. I'm glad it's a woman I'm to marry, not a goddess. I've always thought they'd be awkward company in—' He stopped, changed the phrase. ‘In the home. And, that reminds me.' He turned and shouted an order to one of the torch-bearers. ‘Don't think I've not made my preparations for you. Jenny has your aunt for chaperone.' He laughed, quickly, strangely. ‘Ah, here she is. Oenone, the
Kyria
Phyllida is not well. Take her to her room. Look after her.'

The short, dark-haired, dark-clad young woman who had appeared in the doorway spat something at him in quick, unintelligible Albanian. ‘Take her to her room. Oenone,' he said again, his voice a threat. ‘And speak Greek, so we can all understand you.'

‘I bid you welcome.' The hate in the woman's voice was like a blow. ‘Come with me.
kyria
.'

Passionately, horribly, Phyllida feared being separated from Brett. But again his glance was encouraging. Extraordinary, how they seemed to be able to communicate without words. He wanted her to go with this furious young Greek woman. Here (was he telling her?) was another weak link in the chain Alex had forged for them. She made herself stagger towards the lowering young woman. ‘I'm not well. Help me?'

*          *          *

Some rudimentary preparations had been made in the upper tower room. Sheepskins on the raised bed-place, a table, a chair, and, Phyllida was glad to see, the small bag of necessities Price had packed for her it seemed a lifetime ago. ‘You'll be safe enough here.' Oenone spoke at last and her words showed the same uncompromising dislike as her silence. ‘Milord has the room below. There is to be a guard at the bottom, night and day.'

‘Milord below?' This was wonderful news. She had been horribly afraid, back there when she left him, that she might never see Brett again.

‘Yes.' The woman's smile was cruel. ‘Locked in, like you. So think now, quick, before I leave you, if there is anything you must have—that I can give you.'

‘Some water.' It was a request no Greek would ever refuse. ‘If you please?' At all costs, she must break through the hatred she felt like a wall between them.

‘Of course.' Oenone went to the doorway and shouted a command down the steep stair.

‘There's a spring then?' Anything to get Oenone talking.

‘The best in the Morea. You'll not die of thirst here.' Her tone suggested all kinds of other possibilities, none of them pleasant.

‘No. Oenone—May I call you that?' She felt the girl's recoil, but went on as if she had not. ‘I'm Phyllida. Tell me, are we the only women up here?'

‘The only ones of any account.'

‘I see. And you?' How in the world could she phrase the question.

But Oenone had been waiting for it. ‘I am Alexandros Mavromikhalis' wife.' She spat it out like a challenge. ‘In the eyes of God. We were betrothed in our cradles. I warn you,
kyria
, nothing but disaster will come of your marriage with him. Blood on the hearth and blood in the bed … Nights of misery and days of anguish. Death would be better.' She looked about her, wildly, and Phyllida was actually afraid, for a moment that she was going to produce a dagger from the black folds of her dress and suit the action to the word. At all costs, she must get the conversation down to a lower key.

‘You can't for a moment imagine I want to marry him?' she asked.

‘Who wouldn't?'

‘Not I, for one. Do you understand what he has done to me?'

‘No. Nor do I care. Only that you are here, the priest is ready, all Alexandros' promises to me broken, poured out like water on the ground. What does it matter what you think or say?'

‘But, Oenone, believe me: I
would
rather die than marry Alex.'

‘You think so now?' The girl looked at her strangely. ‘Well, you may get the choice yet. Ah, here's the water.' She took it from a man at the door. ‘I'll leave you to rest.' Savage irony in her tone.

‘You're going to lock me in?' Phyllida was aware of the man waiting outside.

‘Of course. Fear nothing. Alexandros wants you alive. I have orders that your meals be brought you here, except when you eat with him. You will have plenty of time for rest.' And with that she withdrew, slammed the door and turned the key from outside.

Left alone, Phyllida hurried to one of the slit windows that pierced the four sides of the square room. The one where the light shone brightest, it commanded a thin strip of the view she and Brett had gazed at from the plateau. Far off, towards Zante, the sun was setting and the two narrow strips of sea were crimson with its light. Zante! The
Helena
. Where was she tonight? Had Peter really been able to take command?

And now, at last, she must think about Peter, whose treachery was so infinitely worse than Alex's. She sat down, shivering suddenly, on the bed-place. Peter and Jenny. Jenny and Peter. It was worse, infinitely worse than what had happened, what might happen to her. She was old, she felt now, a thousand years old in failure and despair. It hardly mattered what became of her. But Jenny, young, bright Jenny, so gay and therefore so vulnerable. Suddenly, her head was down among the sheepskins and she was crying as if her heart would break.

Or had it, long ago? Vaguely considering this, she settled herself, without realising it, more comfortably among the warm, smelly sheepskins and fell fast asleep.

When she woke, it was pitch dark and she could not think, for a moment, where she was. Then, with the sound of a low,
steady knocking on the door, it all came horribly back. But she made her voice steady as she called ‘Come in,' in Greek. To show panic would be to feel it.

Oenone entered carrying a lamp, and once again Phyllida was aware of a man, half seen in the shadows at the door. Listening?

‘Alexandros sent me.' Oenone's voice still held the note of hatred. ‘To ask whether you would prefer to sup with him and Milord Renshaw, or by yourself here.'

‘Oh, here, please.' Even to see Brett, she could not face another confrontation with Alex tonight. As soon as she had spoken, impulsively, she realised that it was the right answer so far as Oenone was concerned.

‘Very well.' Was there the slightest possible softening in that uncompromising voice? ‘I will give the order.'

‘Oenone!' Phyllida's voice stopped her at the door. ‘Won't you join me?' What plea to use? What line to take? She took none, but left it there.

Oenone put the lamp down on the table and paused to look at her, surprised. ‘You wish that?' She shrugged. ‘I'll ask Alexandros.'

Twenty minutes later, she was back, ushering a man with a loaded tray. ‘Alexandros says he is glad you and I are to be friends.' Irony vied with hatred in her voice, but Phyllida made herself ignore all but the words.

‘I'm glad too.' She moved forward to help unload the tray. ‘Oenone—' The man had retreated to his old place outside the door. ‘Must we have him listening?'

‘Yes. Those are Alexandros' orders.'

Phyllida almost despaired at the lifeless, acquiescent tone. Then she remembered Brett's last glance, his unspoken command. Here was one of the weak links in the chain that bound them. Here was her chance. No use wondering what he and Alex were saying to each other, down in that gloomy dining hall. Her chance was here, with Oenone, who had so much to gain, so much to lose…

She began very slowly and carefully, with general subjects, with the state of Greece, the fighting in Nauplia. Inevitably, Oenone was starved for news of the course of the war and listened eagerly when Phyllida talked of the hopes that were building up of intervention by the Allied Powers.