Angela Devine - Tahitian Wedding

‘Bastille Day is not until the fourteenth of July,’ he pointed out. ‘That’s well over a month away. Claire will have to go home to Australia and her job long before that.’

Claire’s head jerked up and she stared at him. He was standing under a coconut palm with his back to the blazing sunset, so she could not see his features clearly. But the red gleam of the dying sun outlined his taut, muscular body and revealed the tension in his stance. His arms were folded and his chin had an arrogant, challenging tilt to it. An obscure pain stabbed through her at his words. Not only because of the antagonism they revealed, but because of their substance. Alain was right. She would have to be back in Australia long before Bastille Day. Although it would never seem like home to her.

‘Well, we’ll have to see, won’t we?’ she said sweetly, resenting Alain’s obvious desire to be rid of her. ‘Perhaps I could get longer holiday leave from the TV station. Or perhaps I’ll decide to move back to Tahiti permanently. Who knows?’

She saw Alain’s fingers tighten convulsively on his folded arms at that, but he said nothing. And shortly afterwards the party broke up. An hour or so was spent tidying up and chatting to her parents, then the moment Claire had been dreading finally arrived. The moment when she found herself alone with Marie Rose.

Her sister was nothing if not direct. Kicking the door of their shared bedroom shut, Marie Rose flung herself down on one of the beds and fixed Claire with a piercing gaze.

‘Have you and Alain quarrelled already?’ she demanded.

Claire gave a weary sigh, sat down on the other bed and began to undress.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ she protested. ‘I was flying all night, Marie Rose, first from Australia to New Zealand and then to Tahiti. And I’ve just enjoyed an eight-hour party. I’m tired!’

She flung her clothes down in a heap, pulled on a nightdress and huddled into bed.

‘Not too tired to answer me,’ insisted Marie Rose, sitting on Claire’s bed and snatching the covers with a deft swoop. ‘Come on, big sister. Just answer a few painless questions and I promise you can have your sheets back.’

‘Beast!’ cried Claire, snatching wildly.

There was a sharp, ripping sound and they stared at each other in dismay, like two naughty children.

‘Now look what you’ve made me do!’ said Claire crossly.

Marie Rose gave a sudden, explosive giggle. Claire glared at her for a moment, then her gravity dissolved. The two of them lay hooting helplessly with laughter as if they were ten years old again. Then Claire hauled herself up against her pillows, arranged the mangled sheets around her and stared at her sister. Perhaps it was better to get the ordeal over with.

‘All right, what do you want to know?’ she demanded warily.

Marie Rose’s dancing brown eyes sobered suddenly.

‘Have you and Alain quarrelled?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ said Claire curtly.

‘But why?’ persisted Marie Rose.

‘Because he hates me!’ flared Claire. ‘And he makes no secret of the fact.’

‘That’s not true,’ replied Marie Rose. ‘I’m sure it’s not! I would never have asked him to meet you at the airport if I’d thought that.’

Claire huddled her legs into a mound and clasped her arms defensively around her knees.

‘Why did you ask him anyway?’ she demanded. ‘That was one of the nastiest shocks I’ve had for a long time, being met by him.’

Marie Rose climbed to her feet and paced across the room with a guilty expression.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I know you took a dislike to him years ago before you left for Australia, but I’ve never understood why. After all, you used to worship the ground he walked on.’

‘More fool me,’ exclaimed Claire tartly.

Marie Rose sighed.

‘But what went wrong between you?’ she demanded. ‘What did he do to offend you?’

Claire’s eyes took on a haunted look.

‘That’s my business and I’m not prepared to discuss it.’

‘Well, there you are!’ exclaimed Marie Rose. ‘I knew you’d probably refuse to come to the wedding if you knew he was the best man. And I couldn’t bear to get married without you, so I didn’t tell you before you left Sydney. Anyway, I hoped that if I sent Alain to meet you somehow you’d smooth things over between you.’

Claire snorted derisively.

‘Some chance!’ she exclaimed. ‘Especially when he loathes the sight of me.’

Marie Rose sank down on her own bed and stared at Claire in dismay.

‘You keep saying that,’ she protested. ‘But I’m sure it’s not true. Whenever Alain comes over here, he always asks if there’s any news of you and his eyes take on a kind of brooding look. I’ve always suspected that he was secretly in love with you.’

‘In love with me?’ echoed Claire. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘It’s not ridiculous!’ insisted Marie Rose. ‘Don’t you remember six years ago when he first came to Tahiti and Papa had that restaurant down on the beach below Point Cupid? Alain used to come in every day for lunch. I’m sure it’s because you were working as a waitress there.’

‘More likely because he enjoyed Papa’s cooking,’ said Claire sceptically.

‘I don’t think it was only that,’ objected Marie Rose. ‘His face used to light up whenever he saw you.’

Claire’s eyes took on a faraway look as she thought of those long-ago days at her father’s short-lived restaurant. Yes, Alain had come in nearly every day for lunch. But had his face really lit up when he saw her or was that just more of Marie Rose’s imaginative fervour at work? Struggle as she might, Claire found herself unable to remember anything clearly except for the embarassing schoolgirl crush that she had had on Alain. Every time she had gone near him, she had blushed with embarrassment. Yet Alain had certainly not seemed to return her interest. In fact, he had always struck her as rather stern and disapproving of the girlish giggles that sometimes issued from the kitchen. It was true that his brooding blue eyes had sometimes seemed to follow her around the dining area, but only until his meal arrived. And his rare and unexpectedly charming smiles had always been accompanied by some quite trivial remark about the food. Anyway, if he had loved her, wouldn’t he have listened to her version of what had happened with Marcel?

Her thoughts went back to the smooth-talking, handsome Frenchman who had lured her into his embraces six years earlier. Where Alain had seemed like an unattainable dream, Marcel had been all too ready to share Claire’s company. It had begun innocently enough with a chance meeting on Marcel’s yacht in the harbour, progressed through picnics and visits to discos and culminated in that appalling scene in Alain’s house, which she could not remember without a shudder. At the time it had all seemed perfectly harmless. Marcel had announced that his brother-in-law had gone to Paris for two weeks and asked Marcel to look after his house. What could be more natural than for him to invite Claire to lunch? She had gone quite trustingly, never guessing that she would be plied with far more wine than she was used to drinking. Never guessing either that Marcel’s brother-in-law would return home early and discover them together. It had been the final irony to learn that Alain was Marcel’s brother-in-law. And that he was not, as Claire had supposed, Marcel’s sister’s husband, but his wife’s brother. She winced at the memory.

‘Are you all right?’ asked Marie Rose. ‘You look pale.’

‘It’s nothing,’ replied Claire in a strained voice. ‘I was just thinking that you’re wrong about Alain. He doesn’t even like me. We had a quarrel years ago and he’s never forgiven me.’