Barbara Cartland - Lovers In Paradise

Then the manner in which her mother welcomed him to the house when he called, the trouble she took over her appearance and the coy way she spoke to him revealed the truth.

It was not difficult for Roxana to realise that, while she attracted Patrick Grenton as a woman, the wealthy Lady Barclay was more alluring as a wife.

The mere idea that he could be so two-faced made Roxana feel sick.

Patrick was five years younger than her mother, but that did not count beside the fact that he was well known to be always hard up.

Once they were married her mother would be able to provide him with the new hunters he needed and all the comforts which, owing to the raffish way he lived, he was unable to afford.

‘I must get away!’ Roxana told herself. ‘I just cannot live in the house with Mama and Patrick Grenton!’

The idea of his being her stepfather was bad enough but she still had the uncomfortable feeling that, even when he was married to her mother, he would still seek her out and still pursue her as he had done before.

It was, however, difficult to know where she could go.

She had many friends, but then she could hardly stay with any of them indefinitely. And she did not wish to make her mother feel uncomfortable by deliberately asking her cousins or her father’s relatives if she could make her home with them.

It seemed like an inspiration when the idea came to her that she should contact her aunt in Holland.

After all everyone would understand that she should wish to go away when her mother married and what more plausible explanation could she give than that she had been invited to stay with her mother’s sister?

Without mentioning this idea to anybody, Roxana had sat down and written to Agnes Helderik, asking her if she could come to Holland and saying how she longed to make her acquaintance.

The letter that had come in response had been enthusiastically welcoming and, although her mother had been astonished, Roxana had left England as soon as the very quiet Wedding between Lady Barclay and Patrick Grenton had taken place.

Patrick Grenton had objected more strongly than his wife.

“Why on earth do you want to go away?” he had asked angrily when he had learned of Roxana’s plans. “I want you here! I want to see you and talk to you.”

“I have no wish to play gooseberry to you and Mama,” Roxana had answered him.

He had looked at her and she disliked the expression in his eyes.

“You know it is not like that,” he said.

“I know what it is like and I don’t wish to discuss it,” Roxana replied coldly.

“Suppose I refuse to let you go?”

“You cannot prevent me.”

“Are you sure about that? After all as your stepfather I am also your Guardian.”

“I have every intention of leaving this house as soon as you and Mama are married and I advise you not to make a fuss!”

Roxana spoke in a manner which brought more anger into his eyes and his lips tightened.

“If that is to be your attitude about the future,” he insisted, “then sooner or later I will make you regret it.”

She did not bother to answer him. She only looked at him with contempt, but when she left the room she had heard him swearing in a manner that made her shiver.

However she found her aunt, Roxana was determined to like her and stay with her for as long as possible. Holland was at least a refuge from Patrick Grenton.

Actually she had loved Mrs. Helderik from the first moment she met her and her aunt had loved her.

She was, Roxana thought, exactly what she would have wished her mother to be like but Lady Barclay had grown hard during the frustrating years of her late husband’s incurable illness.

Lady Barclay had at first, despite the disparity in their ages, been very happy.

Lord Barclay had been an extremely intelligent man who had given distinguished service to the Crown and was greatly respected in Political circles.

But when he became ill he was like an oak that had been struck by lightning.

If only he could have died after the first ten years of marriage, it would have been easy for everyone to mourn him in genuine sorrow.

Instead he had lingered on and, through no real fault of his own, had gradually lost his friends and the love of his wife and daughter.

It had been wrong, Roxana knew, to be glad when someone died and yet ,when wearing the deepest black, she had followed her father’s coffin to the graveside, she had known that the trappings were only a farce.

It was a relief that after so long he was freed of his tortured body, but Roxana had cried at her aunt’s death as she had never been able to do for her father.

It seemed so cruel and so unnecessary that, when she was so ecstatically happy at having given her husband the son he had longed for after so many years, Agnes Helderik had died.

If Roxana was unhappy, it was nothing compared to the overwhelming grief suffered by Pieter Helderik.

He had not only adored his wife with his whole heart and soul but she was also a part of him, completely necessary both to his mind and body.

He was like a rudderless ship and it was true, Roxana thought, to say that the light had gone out of his life.

He had flung himself into his work in Bali with no less enthusiasm and a one-pointed concentration that was so characteristic of his personality but then from the day Agnes died something was missing.

Before her death everything he had said and done had been spontaneous and seemed to come almost as if it was an inspiration from above. Now he drove himself hard and at times Roxana even thought that he was pretending to feel what was not actually there.

She could not put her finger on exactly what was wrong and yet she knew that her aunt, from the moment she died, had taken with her something that was indispensable to Pieter Helderik.

Soon after coming to Bali Roxana had seen and understood clearly why the Dutch had been reluctant to issue even temporary permits to Missionaries.

She had known without anyone telling her that the intransigence of the inhabitants in religious matters doomed all the Missionaries’ efforts to failure.

All she had read about Bali and all she saw from her own observations made her realise that the Priests, the pedandas , would not tolerate it that any member of their race should go over to a new religion.

When there were Christian converts, although they were very few, they were boycotted and usually hunted out of the community.

Balinese doctors refused to treat Christians and they were threatened that if they died they would not be allowed to be buried in Balinese cemeteries.

She tried tactfully to tell Pieter Helderik what was happening but he would not listen and pretended that he did not believe her. But it was obvious that he was shunned when he moved about the villages.

The Balinese, usually a smiling easy-going people, vanished into their thatched houses when he appeared or deliberately moved away when he attempted to speak to them.

It was only the children who were not afraid and so were not concerned with anything except that he would give them sweetmeats and occasionally buy them toys.

‘It is hopeless! Quite hopeless !’ Roxana told herself over and over again.

But she dare not say it out loud for fear of hurting her uncle more than he had been hurt already.

She knew that he was aware of what was happening as the lines on his face sharpened and he grew thinner and thinner until the clothes he had brought with him from Holland hung on him as if he was a scarecrow.

He found it hard to eat even the delicious dishes that Geertruida prepared and which had been his favourites at home.