The Beads of Nemesis (6 page)

Kyria Holmes merely stared at her. “He is my son!” “But he wouldn’t stop you painting. Why should he?” “His father didn’t approve of my work. Pericles would think it disloyal of me if I were to start again now!”

“I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous!” Morag exploded. “I’ll ask him! I’m not afraid of him, if you are!” To her surprise, the older woman laughed. “Young people these days are afraid of nothing. But I think you are not quite so casual in the way you treat my son as you pretend, no?”

Morag coloured faintly. “What makes you say that?” “You are very brave on my behalf, but would you defy Pericles for yourself? I think not, my dear. You are not so different from your Greek sisters after all. You seek the approval of the man who controls your life, and that is good, very good -”

“Pericles doesn’t control my life!” Morag said.

“Does your father?”

“No one does!”

Kyria Holmes gave a superior smile. “The new, liberated woman? My dear, how little you know about yourself. In England, when my husband was alive, I met many of them and they were none of them like you!”

Morag chewed on her lip, not enjoying the turn the conversation had taken. “Anyway,” she said, “we were talking about you. Why don’t you paint again?”

“You don’t believe me about Pericles?”

Morag opened her eyes wide. “No.”

“He is not my husband, it is true. Pericles would not stop me painting if he knew I wanted to do so, but I’m afraid that after all this time I’d be no good. Worse still, I might not know that I was no good. Do you understand me? My husband refused to allow me to paint on principle. Women, he said, could never be better than second-rate in the arts. I could not disobey him, so I did as he asked and destroyed my paintings, but not the desire, never the urge to paint!”

Morag wondered why, if she felt like that, she should seek to impose the same rigid ideas on women on her granddaughter, but then she didn’t begin to understand what moved the older woman -perhaps Pericles did.

“Pericles would want you to try,” she said certainly. Kyria Holmes looked amused. “Thank you, my dear. I will ask my son when he comes in.”

“Ask me what?” Pericles said from the doorway. His eyes were on Morag and she was very conscious of his gaze. “Morag - Miss Grant-”

“I think you should get used to calling her Morag, Mama.”

His mother lifted her eyebrows, but she said nothing. “Morag has been trying to persuade me to start painting again. What do you think of that?” She threw back her head, challenging her son to renege on his father’s ban. “She has impertinence, this young English girl!”

“Very impertinent,” Pericles agreed. Morag looked up quickly and saw that he was smiling. “And a revolutionary in her own way. Peggy is jumping over the moon because she is going to collect stamps - yes, Mama, she is. I have told her that she may! - and now here you are, all set to start painting again!”

His mother compressed her lips. “I have changed my mind!”

“Because you don’t want to be grateful to Morag?” Morag was shocked that he should suggest such a thing. “She’s afraid, Perry.

Besides, why should she be grateful to me — ”

“I’m not!” Kyria Holmes assured her. “To suggest that I am afraid!” She tossed her head. “If Pericles says I may start painting again then I shall do so!”

“I’ll buy some you paints next time I go to Athens,” he promised.

His mother was far from pleased. “I shall buy my own paints! Afraid! Why should I be afraid of my own son?” She gave Morag a look filled with malicious amusement. “If anyone is afraid, Morag Grant, it is you, and well you might be if you always behave so freely with young men as you did with Takis on the beach. If you were my daughter, you would spend the rest of the evening in your room to teach you to be more circumspect! Such a sight! I’ll leave you alone with Pericles and you can explain to him what you were doing!” She rapped Morag sharply over the knuckles with her open hand. “And then tell me you’re not afraid of him!” she added in a low fierce whisper, and laughed a laugh so like her son’s that Morag could only stare at her, hoping that Pericles hadn’t heard her.

But Pericles had. One look at the mocking expression on his face was enough to convince her of that!

“I - I think your mother would be much happier if she could paint again!”

“Yes, I think she might be.” “And Peggy needs to collect something. If she can’t collect stones there isn’t any reason why she shouldn’t collect stamps, is there?”

“None at all.”

“Then you don’t mind?” she pressed him.

“Did you think I would?”

“N-no.”

He came and sat down beside her. “Are you afraid of me, Morag?

She looked away from him. “Of course not!” The colour rose in her cheeks. “Your - your mother thinks that all women should be afraid of some man. But I am not! Why should I be?”

He sat back thrusting his legs out in front of him, looking the picture of ease and comfort. “Why are you?” he countered softly.

“I’m not - not really! I mean, it doesn’t matter to me what you think of me. I don’t have to stay here!”

She sought in vain for some kind of answer. “I don’t know!” She threaded her fingers together, giving vent to her feelings in the only way she could think of. “I-I’m n-not!” she asserted.

His hand closed over hers. “Not at all?” She could feel his amusement and wondered why he could be so heartless.

“Why should I be?” she compromised.

“My mother is not unobservant,” he remarked. He gave her a humorous look. “She likes you, did you know that?”

“She has a strange way of showing it! She needn’t have mentioned Takis at all!”

He laughed and put an arm round her shoulders, pulling her close to him. “If she hadn’t, I would have done. What did you mean, he’s like David?”

She tried to ignore the feel of his arm about her, but it was hard when she could hardly breathe, let alone move, in case he should take it away again.

“He looks like David when he smiles,” she said. He was silent for a long moment, then he said, “Morag, will you marry me?”

Her heart pounded painfully against her ribs. She struggled upwards, but

his arm pulled her back against him.

“Why?” she whispered.

“You can’t marry David - and I don’t suppose Takis

will oblige - ”

“Why should I want to marry Takis?” she burst out. “I didn’t want him to - to try to kiss me! I only meant that he likes to be admired and David did too! He couldn’t bear it if people ignored him.”

“Yet you loved him?”

She struggled with her conscience, more than half decided to lie to him. “I - I thought I did. I don’t think I know very much above love. He was nice, though, Perry, and very handsome - just like Takis!”

“I see,” he said.

“No, you don’t! I thought nothing mattered when he was dead. Nothing did matter!” She bit her lip. “I like it here. I don’t want to go home. They were glad when I left. They didn’t say so, of course. They didn’t have to! David would have taken me away from them - ”

“Then stay here and marry me,” Pericles murmured. “But why should you want to? Kimon and Peggy - ” “Exactly,” he said. “I’ve never seen Peggy happier than since you came here, and Kimon is more thoughtful of her feelings. They both love you, Morag, and I think they need you. Would

that be enough for you?”

It wasn’t, but she could hardly say so. How could she begin to explain that she wanted his love too? She shut her eyes and tried to imagine what it would be like if the arm that held her would tighten - and if he should kiss her, just the once, as if he meant it.

“Yes, it would be enough,” she said. “But I’d stay anyway. You don’t have to marry me. I’ll stay as long as you want me!”

He put up his hand and pulled on the lobe of her ear, much as he might have done to Peggy. “Oh, Morag! Generous as ever, with never a thought for yourself!” “Sloppy, don’t you mean?”

“It’s rather a nice characteristic when not taken to excess. If you marry me, there will be no more regrets for David, and no more romantic incidents with Takis. You will be my wife, do you understand that? In Greece, we take these things very seriously - ”

“But don’t you want to marry someone you love?” He deserved so much better, she thought. First Susan whom his family had chosen for him, and now herself because his children liked her!

“What about you?” He turned the question.

She took a deep breath. “I want to marry you,” she said.

CHAPTER FOUR

Morag found saying goodbye to the children almost unbearable. “I

suppose we have to go to England?” she said to Pericles.

“I think so. Your family will expect to see you safely married to me. It

will only be a week before we’re back here. It isn’t very long.”

“I know,” she said. “But I wish we could be married here.”

“I don’t think my mother would thank you for the suggestion. All that

trouble and fuss for an English girl she scarcely knows!”

Morag managed a smile. “I thinks she likes to embarrass me.”

“You’ll get used to it!”

Morag wasn’t so sure. She found it difficult enough to come to terms with the idea of being Pericles’ wife without her future mother-in-law’s comments as to how her son would treat her once the ring was safely on her finger. Not that Morag believed that Perry was likely to beat her, or starve her, or even row with her in front of his family, but he was half Greek and the Greeks expected their wives to be subservient to them, and who knew which half of his blood dominated in Pericles? He might be as Greek in that as his name!

Pericles looked at her doubtful face and laughed. “Don’t you want to introduce me to your family?” he asked curiously.

She was immediately enthusiastic. “Oh yes!” A flash of amusement entered her eye. “I shall very much enjoy showing you off to them. You’re much better than anything that Delia has been able to produce!” Her expression clouded over for an instant. “You don’t mind, do you? You’ll probably like her,” she added stiffly. “Most men do!”

“I hope I shall too,” he drawled.

Morag felt despair round her heart. Delia would take one look at him and she would want him as surely as she had wanted anything else of Morag’s, as she had wanted David. Well, she had taken David and Morag had cared, but she had not broken her heart over it, though for a time she had thought she had. But supposing Delia were to take Pericles from her? He was bound to find her beautiful and attentive and far, far more sophisticated than Morag could ever be. He was bound to prefer her to herself. It went without saying, and it was the one thing that she couldn’t bear to happen. Pericles might not love her, but somehow or other he had stolen her heart from her, and that was the only reason she was marrying him, though she had agreed with every one of the practical reasons he had suggested to her, beginning with the children and ending with her own broken romance and the penalty the courts had imposed on her when she had taken responsibility for David’s death and the corresponding gossip that had so dismayed her family. What else could she do but agree with him when he hadn’t mentioned the word ‘love’ once to her certain knowledge?

“Pericles,” she began. Her lashes swept down to hide her eyes.

“Uh-huh?”

“I wouldn’t ask you to pretend exactly, but her cheeks turned scarlet. “I haven’t told them that you find it convenient to marry me, because of the children and so on. Would you - would you mind very much - ” She broke off, unable to continue.

“If I laid more stress on ‘and so on’ than on the children?” he

suggested. There was amusement in his voice.

She didn’t dare look at him. “They all knew that David preferred Delia to me. We all pretended for a while, but they knew, just as I knew.”

“Perhaps we should get into practice,” he suggested.

Her eyes widened and she shot him a swift glance. The brilliant laughter in his eyes did nothing to reassure her. “I only meant,” she said hurriedly, “that - that I’d prefer them to think that we were getting married for all the usual reasons -”

“I know exactly what you want them to think!” he said. “All right, Karthia mou, we’ll play it your way. I may enjoy stringing them all along

- especially Delia!” He put a hand beneath her hair on the nape of her neck and drew her towards him. She felt a suffocating sense of excitement and was immediately afraid that he would know how he affected her.

With a little gasp, she pulled away, but he would have none of it.

“You have to pay for your pride,” she heard him say as from a distance. “We can’t have you getting in a panic every time I touch you or no one will believe I find you irresistible, or that you melt with desire every time I come near you. That wouldn’t do at all, would it?”

She licked her lips. “No,” she said.

The pressure increased on the nape of her neck and, perforce, she had to take another step closer to him. His body was hard against hers and his arms were like two steel bands holding her tightly to him. The excitement within her exploded into something she had never

experienced before. She was trembling and she scarcely knew whether it was with fear of the unknown, or with sheer longing for him to initiate her into that unknown.

“You’re a better actress than I thought,” he said dryly, pushing her hair back from her face. “I could swear you were enjoying this!”

She hid her face against his neck and pretended not to have heard him. But she could feel his laughter and it made her tremble still more.

“Look up, little Morag,” he said more gently. “How can I kiss you when you hide from me?”

She wished she had the courage to do as he asked, but she knew that if she did look up he would see what lay in her eyes.

His fingers stroked the nape of her neck for a few more seconds, then they entangled themselves in her hair and forced her head backwards whether she would or would not. She shut her eyes, putting her hands flat against his chest, her body tense and waiting. “You have to kiss me too, you know!”

“I can’t,” she breathed.

“Why not?” he touched her mouth lightly with his own. “You have two excellent lips just made for kissing. All you have to do is this and this - and this.” The first two kisses were meant to tease her, but the third was of a different quality. It began just like the others, but soon the pressure of his firm mouth parted her lips beneath his and she felt his male joy in conquest as her resistance flared and died, changing into a delicious surrender that wanted only to please him. Her arms slipped up behind his head and the tension went out of her. She felt his hands exploring her back and the soft curve of her breasts and she dug her fingers deeper into his hair. It was tough and virile like him and showed as little sign of bending to her will, and somehow, that pleased her too.