Moonflower Madness (20 page)

‘Oh no!' she whispered, her hands tightening on Ben's reins, sick apprehension flooding through her. ‘It can't be! It isn't possible!'

Almost in the same instant Zachary also recognised the figure approaching them. With a disbelieving blasphemy he reined in, his face tightening, a pulse beginning to throb at the corner of his jaw.

Sir Arthur Hollis strode towards them, fury and hostility in every line of his body.

Hardly able to believe that he was real, Gianetta slid from Ben's back.

‘Uncle Arthur! What are you doing here? I'd no idea … If it's because of me there was no need …'

‘Of course there was need,' her uncle snapped viciously, ‘You've destroyed your reputation! You've brought shame onto every member of your family! How we are to hold our heads high again, God only knows!'

A few feet away from them, Zachary dismounted.

Sir Arthur spun towards him. ‘As for you, Cartwright! I hold you ultimately responsible! You should have escorted my niece back to Chung King the instant she caught up with you! You've behaved monstrously and restitution will have to be made!'

‘Just what kind of restitution did you have in mind, Sir Arthur?' Zachary asked him, his voice dangerously quiet.

Sir Arthur breathed in deeply, his nostrils flaring. ‘There is only one kind that is possible in this situation. An Anglican priest is in residence at the mission. I have arranged that a marriage should take place between the two of you at the soonest possible moment.'

Gianetta swayed dizzily. It seemed impossible to her that the scene now taking place was real and not a hideous nightmare. How could her uncle have known that Zachary would call at the mission house at Peng? How could he have been so sure that he could be able to waylay them? To have reached the mission before them, he must have travelled by boat up the Kialing, yet during the many hours that she and Zachary had ridden along or near to the Kialing's banks they had seen no boat flying a Union Jack.

She wound her fingers tightly into Ben's mane. It was bad enough that her uncle was here at all, without the further humiliation of his demanding that Zachary should immediately marry her. Almost before he had finished speaking, she attempted to protest, but her mouth was so dry that no words would come.

Zachary was not similarly hampered. To her incredulity he was neither furiously angry nor coldly contemptuous. Instead he said laconically,

‘Then you have been wasting the gentleman's time. I have not the slightest intention of marrying your niece.'

‘You have no option!' Sir Arthur expostulated, frothing at the mouth. ‘You have lured my niece into a liaison that has robbed her of the last vestige of honour! You have compromised her utterly and absolutely! You have …'

‘I have done nothing of the kind,' Zachary replied indifferently, taking hold of Bucephalus's reins and beginning to walk with him towards the mission.

At this affront to his dignity Sir Arthur gasped wordlessly for air and then rallying himself, spun on his heel, striding after him.

‘How dare you turn your back on me, Cartwright! Twenty years ago I would have called you out for such an insult!'

‘Pistols at twenty paces?' Zachary asked in mild amusement, looking across at him but not halting in his easy stride. ‘It could be arranged, if it would give you satisfaction.'

‘Damn you for your impudence, Cartwright! What will give me satisfaction is a marriage! Only a blackguard would refuse to act honourably in such a situation!'

They had reached the foot of the verandah steps. An elderly, gaunt gentleman in clerical dress had walked out onto the verandah to meet them; a Chinese stable-boy had hurried round from the rear of the mission and was waiting to relieve them of their mounts.

Zachary handed Bucephalus over to him and turned towards his raging adversary. ‘Then in that case I am quite obviously a blackguard,' he said indifferently.

‘Of the deepest dye!' Sir Arthur riposted, his face white, his knuckles clenched. ‘I will see that you are ruined, Cartwright! I will see that the doors of polite society are closed against you! I will see to it that you are never again given a commission by Kew or the Royal Horticultural Society or the Royal Geographical Society or any other Society!'

The white-headed figure in clerical garb at the head of the steps cleared his throat uncomfortably, but neither Zachary or Sir Arther took the slightest notice of him.

With one foot on the bottom tread of the verandah-steps and his hand and his weight resting on the hand-rail, Zachary continued to face Sir Arthur.

‘Such a course of action would – be most unwise,' he said, and despite the nonchalance of his stance his eyes had narrowed and a hint of menace had entered his voice.

‘Don't try and threaten me!' Sir Arthur spat at him, freshly affronted. ‘Whatever high ideas your friendship with young Rendlesham may have given you, you're a nobody! You can't harm me, Cartwright, but I can damn well ruin you!'

‘Sir Arthur …' the cleric at the head of the steps intervened, deeply shocked. ‘I think perhaps it would be wisest if …'

‘I would take great exception at having my career ruined for no reason other than a refusal to be entrapped into marriage,' Zachary said tightly, ignoring the attempted interruption.

‘Entrapped! Entrapped! No-one has entrapped you, Cartwright! You've entrapped yourself by behaving like the worst kind of scoundrel!'

‘I disagree. Very far from behaving like a scoundrel I have behaved, much to my surprise, as a gentleman. Your niece, possibly with your connivance, attempted first to compromise Lord Rendlesham and then, Lord Rendlesham's arm injury rendering it necessary for him to return to Chung King before enough time had elapsed for her to succeed in her efforts, she turned her attentions to me.'

For the first time since Sir Arthur had accosted him, Zachary looked across at Gianetta.

She was still standing where she had dismounted, too far away to hear the conversation now taking place. As their eyes met his face tightened, a pulse beginning to beat at the corner of his jaw.

‘Whether or not she knew that you would be here to bring her scheme to fruition, I have no way of knowing,' he continued, keeping his voice indifferent only with the greatest difficulty, ‘but I am beginning to strongly suspect that this meeting was most carefully pre-arranged.'

As Zachary's eyes met hers, Gianetta's anger and mortification deepened. How
dare
her uncle have assumed that Zachary had robbed her of her honour? How could he have been so shameless and vulgar as to hurl such an accusation at him without waiting for an explanation of what had, and had not, passed between Zachary and herself? Trying hard not to think of the very definite way in which Zachary had repudiated the demand that he marry her, she began to lead Ben towards the verandah-steps.

Sir Arthur was staring at Zachary as if Zachary had taken leave of his senses.

‘
Connived at? Pre-arranged?
I haven't the least idea what you're talking about! You lure my niece into the wilds of China! You seduce and disgrace her …'

There was an agonized, inarticulate protest from the figure standing impotently at the head of the steps.

‘… you scandalously cast her aside …'

‘For God's sake, I've done no such thing!' Zachary snapped, his apparent indifference vanishing and his very real anger flaring to the surface. ‘Your niece's situation is such that she is in desperate need of a husband and a home of her own. She saw what she thought was an ideal way of securing both when Charles and myself visited the Residency. If she travelled after us and was several days alone in our company, she thought she could charm and compromise one of us into an offer of marriage.'

‘No!'

This time the outraged protest was not from Sir Arthur's deeply shocked host, but from Gianetta.

Her eyes burned in her white, disbelieving face. ‘You can't possibly believe such a thing! I travelled after you because I wanted to see China! Because I wanted to find blue Moonflowers …'

‘And if Charles hadn't so fortuitously injured his arm and been obliged to return to Chung King, her plan might very well have succeeded,' Zachary continued implacably, keeping his attention very firmly on Sir Arthur.

‘It isn't true! I had no such designs …'

‘As for your claim that I have seduced her, your niece is as
virgo intacta
as she presumably was the day she left the Residency.'

Sir Arthur sucked in his breath, his eyes bulging. His host galvanised himself into movement, hurrying down the steps and inserting himself between Sir Arthur and Zachary as if fearing that the altercation was about to become physical.

‘That is enough, gentlemen!' he said authoritatively. ‘That is quite enough! This conversation must come to an end before irreparable harm is done.'

‘There has already been irreparable harm done,' Sir Arthur said savagely.

Zachary merely shrugged, once again in control of his temper, once again affecting indifference.

‘If there has been, it has not been of my making,' he said, turning his back on Sir Arthur he began to mount the steps two at a time.

‘Zachary,' Gianetta's voice was steady, drained of anger and disbelief, thick with a grief she couldn't yet give vent to.

Reluctantly he turned, looking down at her from the head of the steps, a pulse still throbbing at the corner of his jaw, his face shuttered and inexpressive.

‘Your assumptions are wrong,' she said fiercely, her eyes holding his. ‘I never intended compromising either yourself or Charles. I never had any other motive other than the one I have just expressed.'

For a moment she thought he was going to walk back down the steps towards her; he didn't do so. Without a word he simply turned on his heel and entered the mission.

‘Unbelievable!' Sir Arthur fumed. ‘Insufferable!'

The clergyman ignored him. Gianetta's face was so drained of blood that he thought it quite likely she was going to faint.

‘Would you like some tea?' he asked her in concern.

She nodded her head gratefully. The Chinese boy who had led Zachary's pony around to the stables had returned, and she gave Ben a comforting pat and handed his reins over to him.

‘There can be no question now, of course, of your sharing a home with Serena and her husband,' her uncle was saying in clipped, curt tones. ‘Nor of your living alone at Sutton Hall. You have shown yourself to be totally untrustworthy. I can only assume that your Italian blood is to be held responsible for your scandalous behaviour …'

Gianetta was too heartsick to care what he assumed. Not only had her heady taste of freedom and adventure come to an abrupt end, so had the camaraderie between herself and Zachary.

As she allowed herself to be escorted up the shallow flight of steps, she found it hard to believe that, all the time they had been together, he had believed her to be both scheming and devious. Had he believed her when, a moment ago, she had told him that he had been grossly wrong in his assumptions? And if he hadn't, would she have any further opportunity of persuading him of the truth?

‘My father was always vehemently opposed to your parents' marriage, and all his worst fears have come to fruition,' her uncle was saying as their host led them into a large, plainly furnished sitting-room. ‘No good could ever have come out of such an alliance. The Italian nation has always been recklessly hot-headed and regrettably hot-blooded …'

‘I think it would be wisest if no more was said on the subject, Sir Arthur,' his host said with surprising asperity. ‘Your niece is obviously in need of rest and refreshment …'

‘She's in need of a good whipping,' Sir Arthur responded, ‘And where she is going she may very well receive one.'

Gianetta looked around the room. There was no sign of Zachary.

‘And where do you intend me to go?' she asked, finally giving her uncle the benefit of her attention.

‘An Anglican convent,' Sir Arthur said with crisp satisfaction. ‘You will remain there until you are twenty-one.'

Gianetta stared at him, horrified. ‘But I can't bear feeling closed in, you know I can't. Let me go to Lady Margaret Hall. I'll work hard there and …'

‘Oxford?' Sir Arthur snorted derisively as a Chinese maid brought a tea tray into the room and set it down on a low cane table. ‘After the way you have behaved in China, I certainly have no intention of allowing you to run loose in Oxford. You're going to go where an eye can be kept on you, young lady.'

‘But I don't
need
an eye keeping on me,' Gianetta protested vehemently, ‘I need an education in order that I can earn my own living. I need to go to Lady Margaret Hall. I need …'

‘You will need to do as you are told,' her uncle interrupted bluntly. ‘We shall leave first thing in the morning for Chung King. Until then you will have no further communication with Mr Cartwright.' He turned his attention to their host. ‘I trust that you will give me your full support in this matter, Reverend Daly?'

‘I shall certainly try and ensure that your niece isn't further distressed,' Lionel Daly replied a trifle obliquely.

Sir Arthur frowned, unhappy at not receiving a more reassuring response. ‘Then oblige me by making it known to Cartwright that his presence here is offensive. It is unthinkable that he and my niece should spend tonight beneath the same roof.'

‘It is certainly regrettable and I will, of course, suggest to Mr Cartwright that he finds lodging for the night in Peng. If, however, he chooses to remain at the mission then it is an arrangement that will have to be accepted. No-one is ever turned away from here, no matter who they are or what their alleged crimes.'

‘Then you will one day find yourself murdered in your bed,' Sir Arthur snapped caustically. ‘I take it you will have no objection to my niece being locked in her room tonight?'