Вайолет Уинспир - Dragon Bay

Was he filled with despair because he could not climb the stairs to be at the child’s side? Though lacking in Lucan’s charm of manner with children, he seemed fond of Rue — so pretty, so much a Savidge with her alive eyes and vibrant hair.

As Kara entered the Emerald Suite she almost collided with Dr. Fabre. ‘Ah, I wanted a few words with you, Mrs. Savidge. First let me take a look at your arm.’ He did so, and pronounced it almost as good as new. Then he took a look at Kara’s face, which was pale and anxious. ‘The pauvre petite will need much attention in the next few days and I have the hope that you will be her nurse. I could send for one, but that will take time — ah, I thought I was not mistaken in you, madame.’ He gave her a Gallic bow. ‘You will take on the task?’

‘It will not be a task, doctor,’ she assured him. ‘Rue has come to mean a lot to me.’

Dr. Fabre nodded and fingered the stethoscope around his neck. ‘I understand your feelings, madame. Rue is a delightful child, but then it is a strange fact of nature that such children are invariably above average in beauty and intelligence.’

Kara met the doctor’s eyes, and she was wildly tempted to ask him if he had known Rue’s mother. She fought the temptation, for instinct told her that the girl had been quite lovely, and so infatuated with the man in question that she had not counted the cost of loving him.

‘Come,’ said Dr. Fabre, and they entered the cool green room where Rue was tucked up beneath the covers of the fourposter. Lucan stood at the bedside, gazing down at the small face with its faraway look. Rue’s hair was spread on the white pillow, and a bandage encircled her head.

‘Will she be all right, Edmond?’ Lucan glanced anxiously at the doctor. ‘She looks so little and far away from us.

‘She suffers from concussion and needs complete rest and quiet. I have asked your wife to be her nurse, Lucan. I hope you concur?’

Lucan glanced at Kara, but his eyes were too brow-shadowed to be readable. ‘Surely a professional nurse would be best,’ he said.

‘My dear fellow,’ Dr. Fabre looked at him with shrewd eyes, ‘you are concerned for the child and that is only natural, but I am sure your wife can do for her all that a proper nurse would do. I shall be calling in at regular intervals to examine the little one, who may remain unconscious for a day or more.’

Lucan gazed broodingly at his wife, then he turned away and walked into the solarium and Kara could see him looking down at the sea as she was given her instructions by the doctor.

Her answers to his questions were competent, and she told him about her aunt, who had been in her care for several weeks in the old Greek house above the harbour of Andelos. The house where Nikos had been born and where Kara had lived whenever her brother Paul was away on business.

Nikki had been deeply grateful to her for the care she had bestowed on his mother, and Kara had been too innocent at that time to realize that a man’s love is not gentle or grateful or based on childhood memories. If she had known that she would have been prepared for Nikki’s letter from America and she would not have run away … into the arms of yet another man who could not give her his heart’s love.

The lamplight made shadows and the clock ticked softly. Kara sat in a deep chair at Rue’s bedside, and the book on her lap lay open but unread. She was listening to the sea, which sounded strangely angry as it pounded the rocks of the bay. Rushing in, lashing at the lower terraces of the house as if seeking to take back what it had given long ago to the Savidges.

The clock chimed low and silvery, and Kara bent over Rue and laid the back of her hand across the child’s forehead. Last night she had run a temperature, but tonight she was cool-skinned and seemed to stir slightly under Kara’s touch. Kara sat with bated breath, hoping Rue would open her eyes and return to them from out of that world of her own.

Several minutes ticked by, but her lashes did not lift. Such long lashes, their tips curling upwards with a glint of bronze to them — the very same glint that Lucan’s had when he slept.

She was filled with the memory of Lucan at the beach house, the rage of the storm, the flash of the lightning, getting into his eyes and into his kisses until she had not known what she said to him, or felt for him. He was like a demon lover from whom there was no escape. She had thought to escape, but here she sat beside the child he loved so much, and when they met or talked there was between them a state of truce. He knew she would go when Rue recovered. She knew he would try to stop her — not out of love but because she might have his child, and that child might be a boy.

She forced her thoughts away from him and glanced around the green room, which she had transformed with the toys she brought from Rue’s cupboard that afternoon.

Da had sat with Rue while Kara took a nap on the bed in Rue’s room. After a shower and change of dress she had ransacked the toy cupboard and brought an armful to the Emerald Suite. Da had looked at her with sharp eyes embedded in wrinkles and high cheekbones.

‘This a sickroom, Miz Kara,’ she had said. ‘You cain’t put all them toys around.’

‘Rue will see them when she comes to herself and they will help her to forget the terrible thing that happened to her.’ And ignoring Da and her pursed lips, Kara had proceeded to arrange the dolls and soft toys so they were holding out their arms to Rue.

‘You like a child yo’self,’ Da had muttered, and as she went out of the room the points of her Creole turban had seemed like the devil’s horns.

Kara fingered the cherry-coloured ribbons of her quilted robe, and then noticed that one of the dolls had fallen on its face. She went over to straighten it, a favourite of Rue’s with its stuffed body and limbs, painted face and impossibly red plaits. Ginger, she called the doll. Yunk had given it to her a long time ago and she often took it to bed with her.

Kara took hold of the doll to prop it against the dressing table mirror, and she gave a sudden gasp of pain as something pierced her hand. After sucking the pinprick, she examined the doll with caution and found die pin sticking through its head. She withdrew it and found that it was a sharp-pointed bodkin, which could have been used for sewing the doll and might have got lost inside it when it was stuffed.

A bare bodkin, impaling the head of a doll Rue loved. Rue, who lay so still and hurt, her bright head bandaged.

The clock ticked, the sea churned and lashed at the rocks of Dragon Bay, and Kara wanted to snatch up Rue and run with her from this house of menace.

With hands that shook she bundled the doll and the bodkin into the back of a drawer and slammed it shut. Then she hurried back to Rue and stood over her in a protective attitude. Long ago witches had stuck pins in dolls, and an element of superstition still held sway over the people of this island. What if someone in this house wished harm on those close to Lucan? Someone who hated him and blamed him for Pryde’s accident. Someone who had frightened Rue at night, ridden Kara down in the cane, and caused the chandelier to fall.

Kara suddenly wanted Lucan. She wanted him in this room, his strength a barrier against that stalking someone who might at this moment be out on the gallery.

She straightened and listened, and her heart jumped into her throat as she heard the approach of footsteps. They paused, the room next door was entered. …

‘Lucan?’ His name broke from her.

The communicating door opened and he strode in, tall, a dark green sweater to his chin, carrying a pair of steaming tankards. His eyes as he looked at her seemed to collect the lamplight into them and become lambent.