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The surge of emotion she had tried to hold back could no longer be restrained. ‘It means nothing, surely,’ she declared without looking at him. ‘I can’t expect you to feel—responsible for me, if that’s what you are offering to do.’

‘It wasn’t, as a matter of fact,’ he said, getting in behind the wheel. ‘I just want to make sure you’re not making a terrible mistake.’

‘By marrying someone who wants me—someone who is kind and considerate and wouldn’t hurt me in any way?’ She looked straight ahead as they turned into the busy street. ‘Someone I could rely on who would always be there when I needed him.’

He considered her brief summing up of happiness for a full minute before he said, ‘That seems to describe Nikos admirably, but it doesn’t sound very much like you. I can’t imagine you playing tennis and picking oranges for the rest of your life, and I can’t see you being content with a doormat. Besides which, you would be under Kyria Masistas’ broad little thumb in next to no time, with all the spirit crushed out of you as effectively as she crushes the oranges in that great press of hers up there on the estate. It used to fascinate me as a kid—all the pith and juice running out and the rest thrown away. Do you remember how much in awe of her we were in those days?’

‘I’ve stopped remembering,’ Anna said, her heart too full of memories to answer him truthfully. ‘Everything has changed, everything that used to matter.'

‘I’m sorry about that,’ he returned briskly. ‘I would have had it otherwise.’

They drove in comparative silence along the waterfront where the golden balls of spent mimosa had been blown from the trees, making a yellow carpet on the ground. There was something sad about that, she thought, all the beauty of spring shed so quickly to be trampled thoughtlessly underfoot or swept away beyond recall. The trees were still green, their leaves stirring in the wind, but some of the magic had gone and when she looked out across the bay it was ruffled by the afternoon wind which blew in so determinedly across the sand, a strong and ruthless wind with no thought of the damage it might do, although its breath was warm.

When they reached the Crescent Beach she said she could easily walk the short distance to the villa on her own.

‘I’ll go along the shore,' she said. ‘It will give me a breath of sea air.’

‘I’ll walk with you.’

‘No, please don't; you have done enough. Thank you for taking me to the hospital, Andreas. It was certainly a help.’

Dismissed, he let her go, watching as she crossed the terraces to the beach where the waves pounded against the stone breakwater like the fury in his own heart.

She did not see him again for a few days, although she knew that he had visited her mother at the hospital each afternoon, taking Lara and Martha with him on the first occasion and bringing books and magazines for her mother to read. He knew that she would visit in the morning so perhaps he was avoiding her or was busy with Lara and the affairs of the Crescent Beach.

When he finally came to the villa he had something to show her.

‘Take a look at these,’ he said, holding out several ancient coins. ‘They were found on your site. Interesting, eh?’

Their hands touched as she picked up one of the coins, studying it carefully before she could trust herself to speak. She knew enough to place it as a silver gros of the Frankish period, recognising the cross and the king’s portrait on the obverse with orb and sceptre, but which king?

‘Hugh IV or Peter II, the experts say,’ he informed her.

‘Are there many?’ She passed the coin back to him without touching his hand.

‘Quite a few, and they hope to find more, of course. They’re digging in Candy’s Place now. Apparently this was a villa belonging to the Lusignans, or some branch of the family, but most of the buildings were to the east of your site.’

‘Under Candy’s Place?’

He nodded. ‘There’s evidence of quite a large establishment, walls and foundations going farther back than the sixteenth century even—perhaps to Byzantine times. There’s a double-headed eagle with a sword and orb in its claws carved on one of the stones they’ve excavated. Everything’s happening with tremendous speed since you started to scoop out your swimming- pool,’ he added reflectively.

‘I’m sorry, Andreas,’ she said. ‘It might upset all your plans for another grand hotel.’

He smiled. ‘You have a fixation about my future plans,’ he said briefly, ‘but they are not so grand, Anna. I want to keep this shoreline as it has always been—as we remember it—and Lara agrees with me. We can make Candy’s Place the “in thing” without spoiling the atmosphere and we can have a “dig” into the bargain. It’s called making the most of adversity, I guess. We can make old King Peter or Hugh or whoever he was work for us in a lot of ways provided they don’t unearth a palace or something equally inconvenient.’

‘Which means you won’t be able to do anything about Candy’s Place for some time yet,’ she guessed.

‘I can’t add to it, if that’s what you mean, but I can keep the present buildings intact. We’ll still be neigh- hours, Anna, and I think we ought to work together. I don’t intend to build anything more sinister than a breakwater, and that could benefit you, too.’

‘We seem to be both in the same sort of situation,’ she admitted, ‘waiting for official sanction to go ahead with our plans, but it can’t matter so much to you. Will you be here all summer if you mean to build your breakwater at Candy’s Place?’

If there had been anticipation in her voice she had tried to hide it, telling herself that it could not really matter, one way or another, whether he stayed or not.

‘Off and on,’ he said. ‘I’m furnishing the flat at Paphos and Lara has made a final decision about the villa in the Marathasa. She has found just what she wanted, at last.’

‘She—must be very happy.’ Her voice had sounded tense and strained.

‘She has been planning this for a long time.’ He put the coins back into his pocket ‘She will go to Rome and bring Philip back with her when everything is ready.’

‘Philip?’

‘Her husband. Marty’s father.’

Shock was Anna’s first reaction, although she had thought about Lara’s husband several times during the past few days, imagining him dead, or neglectful or just too busy to accompany his attractive wife when she travelled so far afield in pursuit of her own career. Andreas had referred to her very much as the power behind the throne and she certainly seemed a model of proficiency when it came to management, but now Philip Warrender was coming to Cyprus to settle at the villa Lara had found for them in the Marathasa, a mountain retreat that they may have planned for a very long time.

She looked up at Andreas, at last, seeing the futile anger in his dark face and the hidden pain in his eyes. It mattered to him that Philip Warrender was on his way to the Marathasa; it mattered to him very much. Her heart contracted with its own pain, but she knew that he would not tolerate her sympathy.

‘We are good friends,’ he said pointedly. ‘Philip and Lara have done a lot for me. When I first went to work for them I knew very little about the hotel trade, but they were patient because they knew I had this desire to succeed—Lara calls it my potential—and they were willing to take a chance with me. That’s why I could never let them down.’

And so, in love with Lara almost inevitably, he had made his decision not to let anyone down. Perhaps he had come back to Cyprus in order to get away, but there had been no escaping. Lara had followed in his wake and now they were all together again—Philip and Andreas and Lara, who was Philip’s wife.

‘I’m sure you won’t,’ Anna said automatically, although only a few days ago she had accused him of infidelity where his former family was concerned. Perhaps it wasn't the same—young people had a right to fly the nest—and this adult love of his would be something more intense, something so soul-destroying in its hopelessness that it might finally consume him altogether.

‘Let me know what you decide about your mother,’ he said. ‘I can easily pick her up at the hospital when she is fit enough and bring her home.’

‘No, Andreas!’ Her voice faltered. ‘I can’t go on accepting your help like this.’ She spoke with her head turned, ready to walk away. ‘Nikos has offered to take her to Stroumbi once she is fit enough to travel.’

‘You’ll go with her, of course?’

‘I’ll drive up with them, but I can’t stay for more than a few hours.’ She was in command of her emotions now. ‘You should recognise that. Hotels don’t run by themselves. It’s a twenty-four-hours-a-day job.’

‘I’ve offered to stand in for you,’ he reminded her. ‘I know more about hotels than Nikos Masistas knows about oranges or olives and I have a right to help you, Anna. I owe it to your mother.’

She pushed the blown hair back from her forehead. Debts, she thought, everyone owing something to someone else, no matter how much it hurt.

‘I don’t think Mama looks at it that way.’ She moved up the terrace steps. ‘All she wanted was your affection.’ While I wanted your love, she said in her heart. I wanted it always!

A week later they were on their way to the mountains, Anna and her mother and Nikos, driving through the dappled sunlight along the coast road to Paphos and on to Stroumbi with the Troodos etched against a pale sky ahead of them and clad in pine and cypress and cedar in every shade of green.

Before they came to the village Nikos swung the car off the main road and soon they were climbing through one picturesque little settlement after another with the mountains crowding round them and vineyards everywhere. A wide expanse of hills and valleys stretched from the foot of the Troodos, cradling the rivers that flowed westward to the sea, but it was the peaks themselves which dominated the scene. High and fierce and seemingly impenetrable, with monasteries and ruined castles crowning their incredible heights, it seemed impossible that anything could ever have been built there, but long ago men of faith had raised their churches and made their homes in that awesome wilderness of rock and stone and they had endured.

Nikos turned the car off the mountain road, winding down into a remote valley where orchards spread on either side of a broad stream and the farmhouse which was their destination lay quietly in the sun. It was a large, rambling house, old and weather-worn and shaded by tall eucalyptus trees and Cyprus pines growing strongly to shelter it in the north. It was many years since Anna had last been there, but nothing had changed The stillness remained and a sense of peace was everywhere as they drew up before the open main door to be greeted by Kiria Masistas at her welcoming best.

‘What a day you have for your journey,’ she smiled. ‘Not one cloud in sight.’ She opened the door on Dorothy’s side of the car. ‘Welcome to our home,’ she greeted her expected guest. ‘You will recover well here away from the rush and bustle of the coast.’

Anna helped her mother out while Nikos carried her small suitcase into the hall.

‘You have not come prepared to stay for long,’ Helena remarked at sight of such a modest amount of luggage. ‘You will not be wise to return to the heat of Limassol until you are fully recovered. I have a proposition to make,’ she added, glancing in Anna’s direction. ‘We would gladly let you occupy the cottage for as long as you wish. I have had it prepared for you especially, and Thelma will look after your comfort and cook for you. Of course, you will stay here, in our home, for as long as you wish before you decide,’ she added, ushering them into the vast, dim hallway where three arches led to the garden beyond. ‘There is no hurry.’

~ Anna could see by her mother’s expression that the cottage in the grounds would be more to her liking because it would give her independence of a kind and a certain amount of privacy which she would not have in the farmhouse itself, large though it was. Helena entertained extensively during the summer months and Nikos’ friends were free to come and go as they pleased. It was open house to all, as it had always been.

Helena hurried them up the shallow staircase to the rooms she had prepared for them.

‘You will stay over the weekend,’ she said to Anna, making it sound more like a command than an invitation. ‘Nikos will have arranged something for tomorrow, I’m sure.’

‘I wish I could,’ Anna said, ‘but I must go back to the villa. I haven’t a deputy, you see.’ She thought about Andreas and his offer to help, but she had effectively rebuffed him without actually knowing why. ‘I’d love to stay, but I must get back by six o’clock—just in case anything has gone wrong.’

‘Surely there is someone who could take your place for a day or two,’ Helena suggested. ‘It is a mistake to think you can’t go off for an hour or two and leave your responsibilities to someone else.’

‘I suppose so,’ Anna agreed, ‘but we haven’t got such a big staff to fall back on. Andreas offered, but I—didn’t think it was fair to ask him when he has so much to do looking after the Crescent Beach.’

Helena frowned. ‘I hear he has done very well for himself,’ she observed, ‘buying one of the new flats at Paphos into the bargain. It rather looks as if he has decided to stay in the island. I wonder what his origins were.’

‘His parents were very dear friends of mine,’ Dorothy said quietly, ‘and I’m glad Andreas has made good at something he appears to like. He was always very— alert.’

‘Of course, you brought him up, I remember.’ Helena opened the door of a large room at the head of the stairs where the shutters had been closed against the bright sunlight. ‘I was surprised when he went off like that at a moment’s notice, virtually without a word.’

Dorothy looked distressed. ‘It is something I have forgotten,’ she said. ‘We must all make our peace with each other, sooner or later.’

‘
I
would have remained affronted,’ Helena decided. ‘After all, you were his parents in everything but name. He was a strange youth, I remember, always wanting to be out in front, always succeeding where others failed. Nikos and he never really got on. Superficially it appeared that they were friends, but I sensed a rivalry between them even in those days.’ She glanced at Anna once more. ‘What do you think of the Returned Conqueror, my dear?’