The Passionate Sinner (11 page)

Champagne to blot out the pain that might be waiting like a beast beyond those walls, and the yearning to give herself had to be kept in chains ... right up to the possible end the masquerade had to be played out that she was an old maid, grown passionless with the years. Only confusion, anger, could be her reward if she approached him right now and let him discover that her body was young and her heart was eager, and that it didn’t matter to her that his eyes were blind. He was a man, and a lonely one, and he might take what she offered, but there would be no real joy in it. He’d be scornful of what was flung at his head, unasked for. He was still so very proud ... still at heart a man who wanted to do his own choosing.

‘How very sentimental people used to be,’ he murmured. ‘I’d give a lot to see that tired old moon descending—you know, the trouble with being blind is that a man begins to live on memories; the good ones seem sweeter and the bitter ones even more sharp and sour. There doesn’t seem to be any awareness of a future, for how can a man look ahead when he can’t even see?’

Merlin’s arms tightened about her updrawn knees in the tulip silk, and her own slim knees were a poor substitute for the wide shoulders she longed to embrace.

‘A memory that haunts me is of Amsterdam the last time I was there, at my grandmother’s house,’ ash fell from his cheroot, spattering his trousers, and he was unaware of it. ‘A place so old the roof tiles are green-black as the shiny coat of a tramp, and rain, soft rain, had drenched the tulips in her garden and they shone like satin. I suppose you’ve never been there?’

‘No, but it sounds lovely,
mynheer.’

‘It’s a very nostalgic city, and nowhere does the beer taste so cool as at a table beside one of the old canals, with wild onions, brown bread and cream cheese.’

‘Are you hungry,
mynheer?
I could make a snack.

‘No,’ he shook his head. ‘I’m only hungry for the old days—God, what would I give to have it all again, the modest pleasures, the hard work.’

‘Please,’ A sob broke from Merlin. ‘I can’t bear it.’

‘You mustn’t weep,’ he exclaimed. ‘I’m a thoughtless fool to talk in such a way, when your nerves are already over-stretched.’

‘It just isn’t fair that you—a man like you.’ She couldn’t go on and had to cram her knuckles in her mouth or cry it all out, how she felt about him, the part she had played in the tragedy, letting it pour from her system but in the process losing what she had gained of him. He had to hate what had hurt him and cost him his brilliant career, and she would be his target, as they might be the target of that typhoon that roared in the stormy darkness out there.

‘I can feel you biting your knuckles,’ Paul said sharply. ‘If it will help to give way to a good cry, then give way.’

‘But you said you couldn’t stand a whining woman.’

‘Merely a ruse to try and make you go down into the valley. If the typhoon comes this way, then it will take this house apart like some great beast from out of a Lovecraft story.’

‘Then,’ she forced the humour from twisted lips, ‘if I give a curdling scream at the next loud noise you won’t take me for a complete coward?’

‘You are no coward,’ he told her. ‘You have spirit and feeling, and I couldn’t wish for a better companion in a crisis. Your nurse’s training, eh, and something tenacious in your character.’

Twinges of panic and pleasure were induced by what he said, but her endurance was welded to his, to that core of steel in his nature; the tempered strength of a fine blade that could yield without breaking. The hardest, bravest test for her was that she couldn’t find safety and sanctuary in his arms.

The music had died away and she lay back against the cushions of her long-chair and tried to relax. Long since her hair had loosened into a gleaming disarray about her shoulders, for every now and then she would press her hands to her ears, trying to shut out the sounds of trees whose very roots were being torn from deep in the soil, where they had stood since the days of the Dutch colonials. She knew that small, defenceless animals and birds were being driven crazy and she was frightened she might hear their cries.

She had played all those rather scratchy records and she supposed they could play them all again, but somehow she couldn’t make the effort to go and wind up the machine, and she could feel herself beginning to tremble.

‘Why do cruel things have to happen?’ she asked. ‘All those pretty children—the islanders—I can’t bear to think about it!’

‘The people of Pulau-Indah are extremely nice, aren’t they?’ His face was stern and shadowed in the moody light of the hurricane lamps. ‘I had to let them go to the valley, but I’m not certain it was a wise thing to do. A tidal wave would cost untold loss of life—all those merry-voiced children, who I feel sure are as pretty as they sound.’

‘Many of them are really beautiful,’ she said. ‘And so are their mothers and older sisters—remarkably lovely, with long dark hair, and eyes that hold mystery and humour. I can’t blame your cousin for being in love with one of them.’

‘Do you think it might be a good idea if I followed his example,
mevrouw?’
Paul’s voice was both serious and a little cynical.

‘Why not?’ she said, forcing coolness and control into her voice. ‘There isn’t much to be gained from celibacy, is there? Loneliness can be hard to live with.’

‘As you have learned, eh?’

‘As I have learned.’ Her voice tapered off, as if she were indeed a woman who had lived a long time with loneliness, who accepted it as inevitable.

She watched as shadows crept about the room, waiting, hoping for a lull in the wind, a slackening of the rain, a lessening of the shrill noises and the crashings from outside. Her nerves were unbearably strung, yet never had she felt so alive to every pulse beat of her body, every awesome movement, every expression that came and went across Paul’s face. Beside him on an elbow table stood a brass elephant whose harness seemed to move in the shifting shadows ... and then she stiffened and leaned forward and her breath seemed to get locked in her throat. Something was moving on that table, and Paul’s hand was resting on his chair-arm just an inch or so from that section of the table, and the thing that moved was at least six inches long, with scarlet legs and mandibles. ..

‘Stay absolutely still,’ she cried across the room, ‘there’s a centipede on the table beside you!’

Even as she spoke Merlin was on her feet and making a dash for the food trolley which stood near the door. She snatched up a silver dish-cover, moved swiftly to Paul’s chair and slammed the cover down over that black and scarlet, venomous horror.

‘And now what?’ he drawled. ‘I gather you have trapped it?’

‘God—yes.’ She was staring down at the silver lid under which that thing was shifting about on its many legs. towards your hand.’

‘Don’t get into a lather now you have it trapped,’ he said. ‘Go fetch the bottle of cognac—yes, I said the cognac. You’ll recall that we had some after our lunchtime coffee.’

‘I—I’m not about to faint,
mynheer
!’

‘Am I suggesting that you are,
mevrouw?
Kerosene would be a little more efficient, but that cognac is strong stuff and when you have brought the bottle over here you will douse the centipede and burn it. You heard me! It can’t be allowed to escape, now can it?’

‘No,
mynheer.’
Now she did feel a trifle faint and had to pull herself together as she went across to the cabinet for the brandy and returned across matting that seemed to be shaking under her feet. She had to do what he told her—he couldn’t see to do it, and that beastly thing had to be disposed of.

‘Don’t set fire to yourself,’ Paul said warningly. ‘Drench it in the spirit and then set a match to it—are you sure you can manage? Remember the thing is venomous and its sting can kill.’

‘I know,’ she shuddered again as she thought of how close it had crawled towards him, attracted by the warmth of his skin. ‘Couldn’t I crush it with some thing?’

‘You haven’t enough muscle, and I haven’t the eyesight. What was it you slammed down over it?’

‘A food cover—oh, where are the matches?’

‘By the lamps—have you got them?’

‘Yes—
mynheer,
did you light these lamps with matches?’ She gave him a look of horror.

‘Of course!’ He spoke impatiently. ‘Now lift off that lid very carefully, toss on the brandy as if dousing a plum pudding and then be quick with the match, only don’t set light to yourself!’

‘You could do that, lighting lamps with matches!’

‘What else would I use, an incantation? Now get set— you have the cork out of the bottle?’

It popped as she drew it.
‘Mynheer,
do you mind going over to the other side of the room? It might get on you —the centipede, I mean. Please?’

‘I’ll stand just here.’ He rose from his chair and moved round to her side, tilting his head in that listening attitude as the brandy gurgled out over insect, table, matting and parts of Merlin’s silk skirt. The large insect, released, scurried in a circle, then halted as if dazed by the strong spirit. In that instant Merlin struck a match and dropped it flaming on to the soaking wet centipede, which in an instant was aflame and crackling.

‘Slam that cover back on,’ Paul ordered, and with a shaking hand she obeyed him, and was glad not to witness any more of the incineration.

‘Good,’ he approved, ‘and now take several deep breaths and you won’t be sick.’

‘Y-you can be quite ruthless, can’t you?’ She swallowed and the nausea ebbed away. ‘I shall have nightmares about that.’

‘Console your soft heart with the thought that it had to be done, but for a few minutes it took your mind off the typhoon, eh?’

She gazed up at him, rubbing at the same time at her brandy-dampened skirt. ‘Shall I leave the remains where they are, or will it be all right if I take them to the kitchen and wash them away? I could make a pot of tea?’

‘I don’t know.’ He stood there, eyes narrowed, listening with hyper-acute ears to what was going on outside the comparative safety of this room. ‘Get a table napkin and wrap the corpse in that and hide it somewhere. We’ll have that champagne, I think. It will be good for both of us.’

‘As you say,
mynheer.’
She wasn’t going to argue with him, and with the aid of a napkin she swept the remains of the centipede from the table and quickly folded it up, taking it to the trolley and placing it with the remains from their lunch. ‘The little table has been scorched,’ she told him.

‘But for you my hand would have been stung.’ A smile edged his lips, but his eyes were serious. ‘My grateful thanks for your quick eyes and your level head. Some women would have had hysterics.’

‘I’m not that sort—oh, it’s such a pity that we can’t have tea. I do fancy a cup!’

‘The typical Englishwoman.Always tea in a moment of crisis, eh? But bang wine is much more glamorous, and we have to celebrate the fact that you probably saved my life. I shouldn’t much care to go that way.’

‘I shouldn’t much care to see you go—that way,’ she said, colour rising into her cheeks. ‘Shall I bring you the champagne?’

‘If you will, and the wine glasses.’ He seemed to watch her, gauging her movements from the silky ripplings of her skirt. ‘To have conquered a crisis is always exciting, and now you and I,
mevrouw,
will get ourselves just a little on the wrong side of sobriety.’

‘Tipsy, you mean?’ She came to him with the long-necked bottle and the pair of stemmed glasses, loving his tallness as she stood near him, her eyes upon his hands as he stripped the foil from the bottle and took leverage on the cork. It moved under the long, strong fingers and came out with a hiss, the pale gold wine bubbling over his skin.

‘You will have to pour,’ he said, handing her the bottle. ‘Generous measures for both of us, do you understand?’

‘I think so.’ In that moment a sudden disturbing stillness had fallen over the house. The lamps burned with a matching stillness and overhead the fans creaked almost loudly. Merlin poured the champagne and placed Paul’s glass in his hand; he thanked her softly and his features were as if moulded in bronze, with not a flicker of a muscle, not a movement of an eyelash as he listened to the silence. She could feel him listening with his entire body, and she took quick nervous sips of her wine. She knew that every one of Paul’s senses was attuned to what was happening out there in the darkness—waiting, like a beast with claws extended towards them.

‘Merlin,’ never before had he called her by her first name, ‘there is an alcove in this room, but I can’t quite recall its direction. You will take hold of my hand and lead me into it, and then you will place cushions on the floor, and there we will drink our bang wine and think only of the good times we have had in our lives. Maybe not too many, but enough, eh?’

‘The eye?’ she breathed, clasping his fingers with her left hand.

‘Yes, right above us, Cyclops watching, deciding what to do with the island. It isn’t terribly big and if the eye descends, then it will sweep Pulau-Indah back into the ocean.’

‘Oh, God! All those people—those children!’

‘Yes, but try not to think about them, though I know that is asking a lot of you. The alcove will provide some moments of shelter for us, so lead me there.’

‘I’m glad,’ her fingers tightened on his, ‘that I didn’t leave you to face this alone. I’m glad I’m with you!’

‘You are talking like a romantic girl,’ he crisped. ‘What can a blind man do for you? I am in your hands!’

She took him into the alcove at the far end of the room, gulped a little more champagne, then collected all the cushions and piled them on the floor.

‘Now bring the bottle,’ he said. ‘It would be a pity to waste such an excellent wine.’

They settled themselves among the cushions and after her second glass of champagne Merlin gave a sudden giggle. ‘It’s crazy,
mynheer,
a pair of grown-up people lolling about like tipsy teenagers at a Hallowe’en party. When do you reckon the poltergeist will start throwing the furniture about?’

‘Soon, or not at all. Suspense has a frightening yet fascinating quality to it.’ There he broke off, for in that moment the wind woke up again, rising to a sudden shriek like something demented. ‘Quick, get rid of those glasses and the bottle—get them out of the alcove in case they break!’