Sleep in the Woods Page 8

  “Not yet,” he said. “Not until I’ve said what I came to say.”

  “You have no right to say anything to me! It’s nothing to do with you if I chose to dance tonight. It’s to do with my mistress only. And if I’ve ruined her dress, that’s nothing to do with you either. So please go back the way you came. This minute!”

  “Now wait,” said Saul, laughing with amusement. “I haven’t come to chastise you. I’ve come to ask you to be my wife.”

  “Your—your wife!”

  Her incredulity made him look at her with even greater interest. Perhaps he had startled her. But even so he had not expected a reception even remotely like this the first time he spoke those momentous words.

  He had pondered on speaking them for some years now, but he had never thought they would be said in such strange surroundings, by candlelight in a narrow servant’s bedroom to a girl with a paper white face who stood with a curious instinctive pride in her petticoat.

  “But that’s utterly impossible!” she said, and had even the effrontery to speak haughtily, like an outraged gentlewoman.

  “Why is it impossible? You danced in that ridiculous dance tonight. You must have done it because you wanted a husband. So why do you look at me with such contempt?”

  “In the first place,” she said, “are you in the habit of climbing through the windows of ladies’ bedrooms at night?”

  In spite of the cutting quality of her voice, her enunciation pleased him. She spoke with a better accent than her mistresses did. And at this moment the fury in her eyes might have quelled even the warlike Te Kooti himself.

  “I apologize for that,” said Saul, enjoying himself enormously. “But you asked for it. And I couldn’t scare the other servants out of their wits by bursting through the house. Besides, you look very fetching in that petticoat. Why haven’t I seen you before?”

  “You have!” she retorted furiously. “You knocked a tray out of my hands one day. But it was another man who picked it up.”

  “Oh!” he said slowly, his eyes narrowed with amusement. “I see it all now. That little episode made you think you fell in love with this man. And so you planned to smuggle yourself into this affair tonight. A brilliant idea, of course, but not infallible.”

  “Someone tripped me!” she said in a muffled voice. “It spoiled the whole thing.”

  “And so you have ended up with me.” His voice was sardonic. “And I with you.”

  She backed away from him, her slim fingers taut. “Nothing of the kind! I haven’t the slightest intention of marrying you, even if you meant your absurd proposal.”

  “I meant it,” said Saul. “And what’s more, it shall happen. And you’ll find me a much more interesting husband than the one you planned to get, I assure you.”

  “You’re quite abominable!”

  He smiled, enjoying again her fury. Then he reached out and pulled her into his arms.

  Before she could scream he had kissed her.

  He didn’t know whether she would have screamed, anyway, for when he let her go she made no sound at all. She cowered back against the wall, looking at him with those enormous eyes. Suddenly he had an almost overmastering impulse to take her in his arms again and throw her on the bed and strip off even that scarcely modest petticoat.

  But no. He could wait. She was to be his wife. She would be worth waiting for.

  VIII

  BY THE TIME she heard the carriage returning and voices outside, the loud decisive tones of Aunt Charity followed by Uncle Hubert’s soothing mumble, Briar had packed her box and was dressed in her outdoor clothes.

  She was very pale, shadows of exhaustion and distress beneath her eyes, and her lips still throbbing slightly from Saul Whitmore’s kiss. She had never been kissed before, and she had not known the angry confusion of feelings such an experience would bring.

  When her door was flung open by Aunt Charity, monumental and overpowering in her black satin, she was still biting her lips to cool their burning. But she had enough presence of mind to speak first. For she did not intend to pretend a humility she did not feel.

  “I’ve packed my box, ma’am, and I’m just leaving.”

  “Leaving! And where do you propose to go at this hour?”

  “To the barracks where Fred and Jemima Potter are. But I didn’t think you’d care where I went, ma’am.”

  Aunt Charity was obviously struggling to control her feelings. Her mouth worked and her small eyes blazed furiously. But from the background Uncle Hubert’s calm voice came.

  “Bring her out here, Charity. We can’t all talk to her in her bedroom. Bring her into the drawing room where she belongs.”

  “Belongs!” whispered his wife incredulously.

  “From now on,” said Uncle Hubert. There seemed to be an undercurrent of amusement in his voice. “You can’t entertain Saul Whitmore’s wife in a servant’s room. After all, she may be a countess one day.”

  “It’s monstrous!” Aunt Charity got out in a strangled voice. She opened and closed her hands helplessly. Then she managed to say, “Come into the drawing room, Briar. We want to talk to you. And take off your cloak. You’re not going anywhere. Not tonight, anyway. Because we have a great deal to discuss.”

  Sheer surprise made Briar follow Aunt Charity’s large doom-like figure meekly. Uncle Hubert stood aside to let her pass. “I see you’re wearing the greenstone tiki,” he whispered. “You’ll need it.”

  The good luck charm which she had kept on under Sophie’s dress that evening. Much good it had done her, Briar thought ruefully. She had been tempted to throw it out of her window, but a strange superstition as to the power of this little, grinning, irreverent god had stopped her.

  “Sit down, Briar,” Aunt Charity commanded austerely.

  Both hanging lamps had been lit, and the room looked grand and forbidding. Briar had never before sat down in it, and now perched nervously on the edge of one of the mahogany chairs.

  Uncle Hubert, indeed, was the only one of the three at ease. He took a leisurely time lighting his pipe, and said conversationally, as if Briar were a guest who must be entertained, “Sophie and Prudence have stayed on at the ball. Mrs. Brown has taken on chaperoning duties. Sophie’s having the time of her life, but Prue wouldn’t dance in that damn fool dance. I don’t blame her. That’s for the adventurous, not the meek.”

  Briar looked from his unmistakably twinkling eyes to Aunt Charity’s, still blazing with their baffled fury. “I’m sorry if I’ve made you very angry, ma’am,” she said stiffly.

  “Angry!” burst out Aunt Charity. “Why, I’d like you out of the house this minute, no matter where you went. I’m quite shocked and disgusted at the way the moment you girls reach this country your heads get full of grand ideas and you’re no use any more as decent obedient servants. I knew this would happen to you the moment I set eyes on you.”

  “Now, my love! That’s not what we planned to say to Briar.”

  Aunt Charity gasped and puffed out her chest, and subsided. “Very well, Hubert. But that I had to say, or die. Now Briar, Saul Whitmore has come to us and told us he wants to make you his wife. Why he has reached this decision is not for me to guess at, but I’d point out that it’s a very great honor he is doing you, and I only hope you will be able to prove yourself worthy of it. So you see,” she smiled wryly, “whatever you planned to do tonight, you succeeded.”

  “But I didn’t!” Briar gasped.

  “I have explained to Saul, and he knows it himself, that this wretched dance, which, of course, must be forbidden in the future, was not to be taken seriously. But he is very strangely obstinate. He says he’s determined to marry you. So my husband and I, since your parents are not here—” Aunt Charity could not resist shooting an angry glance at her blandly smiling husband—“have agreed that you should remain in this house, temporarily at least, until further plans are made. No one wants a scandal. And one must, after all, be broad-minded in a new community. Social values have to be reappraise
d quite frequently. I’m sure—” her stiff reluctant voice stopped, and Uncle Hubert finished easily: “What my wife is trying to say, Briar, is that you are of the stuff of which pioneers are made, and we’re quite sure you’ll make Saul a very successful wife.”

  Briar sprang up, her cheeks crimson. “But I haven’t the slightest intention of marrying Saul! You’re all making the most enormous mistake. It wasn’t Saul I meant to marry! But now everything is ruined!”

  And abruptly she ran sobbing from the room.

  The girls were home and Sophia was demanding, “Where’s Briar? What has she to say for herself? Has she apologized for wearing my dress? My best one, too. I’ll never be able to wear it again.”

  “My dear Sophia,” said Uncle Hubert, “one day, say in a hundred years, a facsimile of you will stand in a glass case in a museum bearing a card, ‘Type of gown worn by young woman in later Victorian period,’ and no one will see your face or your eyes or your lips or your soul. Because that’s all you will represent, the fashions of your day. And that, heaven help you, is all you seem to represent at this moment.”

  Sophia looked at him uncomprehendingly. “Uncle, don’t tease. I’ve had such a wonderful evening, in spite of Briar. I believe Peter’s on the very point of proposing. I shall accept him, of course. Actually, Briar’s behavior has helped me to make up my mind, so perhaps she has done me a good turn. Where is she?”

  “She has gone to bed,” said Aunt Charity repressively. “She’s hysterical and quite tiresome. But she’ll see reason in the morning. Personally, I’d be glad never to have to set eyes on her again. Now I must go to bed or I shall collapse. Prudence, would you bring me some sal volatile.”

  “Of course, Aunt Charity. And a hot drink? Something soothing when you are in bed?”

  “Well—some hot chocolate, perhaps. That makes me sleep, if ever I shall sleep again.”

  When she was in bed, ensconced in her nightcap and all-enveloping nightgown, she gave an enormous sigh. Prudence was tiresomely without spirit and vivacity, constantly mooning over that wretched sailor, but at this moment she was quiet and comforting. Aunt Charity sipped her hot chocolate and began to revive.

  “I wanted to dismiss that impudent chit instantly, but your uncle forbade it. He said that I could be a laughing stock, or I could be the admiration of all intelligent people for my tolerant attitude. After all, one does have to be tolerant in a small community with such a mixed population. And if this girl is to be Saul Whitmore’s wife, one simple can’t quarrel with the Whitmores, as your uncle sensibly pointed out. But if New Zealand is to be ruled by these impudent little baggages, I tremble for its future. Besides, I had so counted on Sophia—” she sniffed weepily—“Saul had seemed greatly taken with her. But there! Your uncle says all isn’t lost. Although I do wish he wouldn’t enjoy this impossible situation!”

  Prudence patted her hand. “Don’t worry, Aunt Charity. Get some sleep. You’re tired.”

  “I’m utterly exhausted! You’re so kind, my love. You’re a dear child. I’m very fond of you.”

  “Thank you, Aunt Charity.”

  “Sometimes I wonder—I mean, one tries so hard, and finally captures one—but is it really worth the effort?”

  “What are you saying, Aunt Charity?”

  Aunt Charity’s face was crumpled and bleak. “What am I saying? Merely how peaceful a bedroom is without a man in it.”

  Then she sighed again, resignedly. “Run along, child. Your uncle will be wanting to come to bed.”

  The next day Briar sat again on the edge of one of the mahogany chairs in the drawing room.

  Perhaps it had been the whisky he had drunk the previous night, Saul reflected. What else had made him think this girl was such a creature of mystery and fire? Or perhaps it had been that she was in her petticoat, her hair tumbled, her shoulders naked, her slim waist blooming into the lovely curve of her breasts.

  For now, in her neat gray gown with her hair smoothly pinned back and her face closed, she was a stranger. He didn’t know her at all. Much less did he want to make her his wife.

  Unless he were to discover again that other identity of hers, the furious person whose eyes blazed green fire, and whose taut hostile body suggested such rich promise.

  If he had not dreamed her, of course. Looking at the chilly person opposite him he was afraid he had. But he was a man of honor, and he meant to stick to his word.

  “Thank you for allowing me to see you again,” he began. It was not possible for him to speak humbly. The aloof politeness of his voice was his nearest approach to humility.

  “I understood you wished it,” she answered, with equal courtesy.

  “I did. Perhaps I was too abrupt last night—”

  “I’m only seeing you because they insisted that I do so,” she broke in, and he realized all at once how hard it was for her to retain her attitude of dignified aloofness. She was still seething with anger, and she was not normally inarticulate.

  He was right about her, by heavens! Exultantly he wanted to laugh out loud. She would be won, but after a fight. One owed it to her to allow her to salve her pride in this way.

  “It’s very generous of you to see me. I acknowledge I behaved badly. But I also meant what I said last night. I want you to be my wife.”

  She raised her eyes then. As green and cold as that Maori charm she was wearing around her neck, they gazed at him. “Thank you, Mr. Whitmore, for your courtesy, but it isn’t possible for me to accept your offer.”

  “Why not?” he asked bluntly.

  “I suppose, among other things, because I don’t love you.”

  “I shall make you do that, I promise.”

  Her chin tilted. “Shall you indeed, Mr. Whitmore? But I fear you won’t have the opportunity.”

  She was only sitting across the room from him. But the carpet might have been the width of a raging flooded river, or the snow-capped range of the Rimutaka mountains.

  If he had her in his arms again … Damn it, that one kiss was not all he was ever to have! He flung his riding crop down and exclaimed, “This isn’t a thing I make a habit of doing, nor do I do it lightly. You’re the first woman I’ve asked to marry me. I have a house ready for you. From the upstairs windows you can see over the top of the forest to the peak of Mount Egmont. The rooms are large, and there’s adequate furniture. You can find a maid and take her with you. We’ll sail to New Plymouth, and then ride across country. The country is beautiful, wild and green and full of birds.” He paused in his enthusiasm. “Is it because you are afraid of the Hauhaus?”

  “I am not afraid of anything.”

  But her voice trembled slightly, and he knew that she was afraid of something. The hostile Maoris? Himself? He remembered his heated defense of her to his mother, and his voice came as near to gentleness as it ever would.

  “I promise I would take the greatest care of you always.”

  But this again was the wrong thing to say, for where she countered arrogance with arrogance, now his momentary softness aroused her to hysteria.

  “I don’t want you to take care of me, Saul Whitmore! I’m perfectly well able to take care of myself. I thank you for calling, and for your kind offer but—” she had risen and was wringing her hands agitatedly. Her face was brilliant in her distress. “Now will you please go. The whole thing is impossible. I can’t marry you.”

  He made a movement towards her, but she backed away.

  “I’m asking you to go,” she begged. “You have done this out of courtesy, and I’m refusing your offer. So your honor is satisfied. There’s nothing more to be said!”

  “There’s a great deal more to be said!”

  “No. Nothing at all. I dislike you, and I never want you to touch me. So please go.”

  He stared at her a moment in disbelief. Then he looked absently at his empty hands. So she never wanted him to touch her again. Had she minded his touch so much? Had she shuddered from it just now?

  A wave of heat swept over h
im. Suddenly as angry as she, he picked up his riding crop and strode out of the room.

  Briar realized that she could not stay on at Aunt Charity’s. Already she was in the uneasy position of being between two worlds, with cook grumpily bringing her meals to her room, and Sophia apologizing for requiring her services.

  “But if you’re really not going to marry Saul you’ll have to go on being a lady’s maid, won’t you?” Sophia pointed out. “I think you’re mad. I’d jump at the chance, especially in your position. Why, you’ll have your own house!”

  “Aren’t you angry with me?” Briar asked.

  “I am, for ruining my dress. But otherwise no,” said the good-natured Sophia. “I’m very happy. Peter’s going to propose any day now. He’s just being a little bashful.”

  Is he? Briar wondered, and refused to believe that this would happen. She was not in love with Peter. She didn’t love anybody. But she was bitterly resentful that her plans had been frustrated. She couldn’t tolerate failure, and it would be doubly infuriating if Sophia should succeed where she had failed.

  On an impulse she went to see Miss Matthews, the clever dressmaker of whom Aunt Charity had spoken, and suggested sewing for her. She sewed very neatly, she explained, and would not mind long hours, or the endless seams of crinolines and flounces.

  Miss Matthews, a small, sharp-eyed monkeyish woman, looked at her with deep interest.

  “So you’re Saul Whitmore’s latest fancy?”

  Latest fancy! Briar’s chin went up haughtily. “He wants to marry me.”

  “So I hear.” The shrewd eyes went over her. “I believe I can see why. You don’t look a namby pamby, at least. Why don’t you have him?”

  “Because I don’t love him.”

  “That’s a reason, but not a practical one. Yes, my dear, I’ll give you a job if you need one. But you’ll sew here for twelve hours a day and ruin those pretty eyes. It’s stuffy in summer and cold in winter and dusty and windy all the time. And no matter how irritating and stupid your customer is, you must always be polite. You might find it easier than being mistress of Saul Whitmore’s fine house. Certainly it will be less exciting. But I’ll wager I’m making your wedding dress before the summer is over.”