Dennis Wheatley - The Rape Of Venice

'For cleverness I vow you beat the Devil!' Roger exclaimed in grudging admiration. "But what when the twelve months are up? And that's not all! He is not, as I suggested, an old fellow with one foot in the grave whose last hours you could make happy in exchange for the fortune he would leave you.'

She shrugged again, 'Let the future take care of itself.'

'Futures do not take care of themselves. You will have saddled yourself with this man. And who is he? A nobody! A tradesman! Even if you can continue to deny him his rights indefinitely he will be your husband. From his talk at table on several occasions, he has made it plain that in a few years he intends to retire from business and settle down in England. To be- married to a rich merchant in Calcutta is one thing, but do you return home with him your marriage will be regarded as an appalling misalliance. Neither men nor women of breeding can defy custom in such a matter. No doubt Georgina would receive him for your sake but, decent fellow though he is, he would be a constant source of shame and embarrassment to you; and in the main you would find yourself ostracised by the sort of society you were brought up to mix with.'

'Roger, dear Roger,' she shook her head. 'Your concern for me is needless. No doubt had I waited till we reached Calcutta, I would have found a man to whom there would not have been these objections. But Sidney was ready to hand and he will serve my purpose well enough. In fact he has proved a godsend for I'll be able to hold you to your promises so much sooner.'

'But it's the future, girl! You must think of the future!'

'I'll not be thwarted by consideration for it. In the last event I can always leave him.'

'You'd still be his wife, and he'd have every reason to refuse to support you.'

'Then I'd support myself.'

'How? By returning to Europe and becoming a kept woman? No, I'll not have it. I'll not allow you to marry Sidney Winters.'

'How do you propose to prevent me?'

'You are not yet twenty-​one.'

'You've no proof of that and, if need be, I'll take an oath that I am. You've no proof even that you are my Uncle. It will be said that you are trying to prevent my marrying him on snobbish grounds. They are no legal objections, and there are no others.'

'There is one way I can stop you,' he said suddenly. 'That is by marrying you myself.'

'Roger! D'you mean that?'

'Yes. Why not? This voyage has been hell for me. Day after day I've had to watch you flirting with those nincompoops, while having got myself into a situation where I could hardly exchange a word alone with you. Although I know I have no right to be, and that you have given me no cause, there have been nights when I have been driven half insane with jealousy and longing for you.'

'Then you do love me!'

'Did I ever say that I did not?' Throwing his arm round her waist, he made to draw her to him, but she swiftly put a hand on his chest and pushed him back.

Wait!' she gasped. 'One moment! Don't kiss me yet or I too shall lose my head.'

Both their hearts were hammering wildly. He refrained from tightening his hold and, when her breathing eased, she said: It's no good, Roger. Everyone believes you to be my Uncle.'

Hell!' he muttered. 'I had forgotten that. But we'll get round it somehow. I'll swear an affidavit that we agreed to call one another “niece” and “uncle” only to make our association appear more conventional while travelling and that you are, in fact, only my deceased wife's cousin.'

She gave a sob. 'It… it's not only that! I cannot take you at the price.'

Price!' he repeated, frowning. 'What price?'

'Why, at the price of knowing that you are doing this only to save me from myself again. You made it abundant plain how much it meant to you to keep your freedom. We'd be deliriously happy for a time, I know. But later you'd come to hate me for the restraint I put upon you. I came aboard the Minerva to be your mistress, not to trap you into taking me as your wife; and I'll not do it.'

For a quarter of an hour they argued about it, but she remained firm in her determination. All she would agree to was that if, after she had been his mistress for six months, he then wished to marry her she would, by hook or by crook, make Winters secure an annulment of their union on the grounds of non-​consummation.

Even then Roger still strove to persuade her at least to postpone her marriage to Winters until they reached Calcutta, hoping that during the two or three months the voyage had yet to run something might occur to make her change her mind about going through with it. At length he wrung a reluctant promise from her that for the next twenty-​four hours she would consider the question of a postponement, and that she would tell Winters that in the meantime he was not to mention their engagement to anyone else.

Still intensely worried, Roger accompanied her across the deck then down the companionway. At the bottom they separated to take their cloaks back to their cabins. As he hung his up his natural buoyancy of spirit came to his aid. He had before now countered in much less than twenty-​four hours worse blows of Fate.

Having secured a night to think in and a day to work in, he felt that he would have lost his touch if he could not prevent Clarissa marrying Winters in Cape Town. There must be some way of sabotaging the old fool's joyful expectations; and in the long run that would be for his own good, however much Clarissa might have persuaded herself to the contrary. If there were no other way, Roger decided, he could always force a duel on him; although it would be hateful to have to do so. The odds were all against the merchant's daring to fight and, if he refused, Clarissa, who admired bravery above all things, would never marry him after he had displayed cowardice.

But wouldn't she? There was no question of her admiring, or not admiring, Sidney Winters. She was simply making use of him for her own ends. She would probably marry him all the same and all he, Roger, would have done would be to earn the frigid disapproval of the whole ship's company for having challenged a man who was so obviously unable to meet him on equal terms. He would be sent to Coventry and Winters would have everyone's sympathy. No, that would not do. But there must be a way and he was determined to find it.

He met Clarissa again at the entrance of the saloon and they went in together. On their appearance there fell a sudden hush. The various games that had been in progress twenty minutes earlier had all broken up; the passengers had congregated in a little crowd at the far end of the saloon, and in their centre stood Sidney Winters. Lady Beaumont broke from it and came hurrying towards Clarissa.

'My dear!' she exclaimed, fluttering her plump hands, uncertainly. 'My dear; can this really be true? If so, I'm sure I wish you happiness.'

Winters, a seraphic grin on his face, came forward just behind her. Clarissa, frowning at him over her chaperone's shoulder, said quickly: 'It seems, Sir, you have deprived me of the pleasure of informing our friends of our intentions.'

'My love,' he replied, with a smile of contrition. 'Having obtained your uncle's consent to our engagement, how could you expect me to wait one moment longer before publicly declaring myself to be the happiest man in the world?'

At that Roger really was hard put to it to restrain an impulse to stride forward and smack the ecstatic smile from the merchant's face. He felt certain that Winters, having seen him take Clarissa up on deck, had feared that he would persuade her to change her mind; so to make it more difficult for her to do so he had deliberately made the announcement while they were still absent. And he had played an ace. Clarissa had been loath to postpone the announcement for twenty-​four hours; so she would not now retract. Winters had, too, been justified hi saying that Roger had 'sanctioned the engagement. That was another ace; for, although Roger had actually prefixed the words with 'it seems I have little option but to…he could not now flatly deny that he had done so. Seething with concealed fury, he was compelled to admit to himself that, for the time being at least, Winters had got the better of him.