Second Best Wife (2 page)

'Jennifer isn't going to marry you.'

His face hardened. 'On your say-so?'

Georgina opened her eyes wide. 'Why should you think that?'

'Because you've bossed the poor girl about unmercifully ever since I've known you! It was one in the eye for you when we got engaged, wasn't it? Did you have to break it up? Couldn't you have contained your jealousy for your sister just this once?'

Winded, Georgina stuttered a denial which withered on her lips as she read the full depth of his contempt for her in his expression.

'She's going to marry
Duncan,'
she explained.

'Oh, is she? We'll see about that!'

Georgina recovered a little. 'You mean it's all right for you to bully her, but not for me?'

He pulled the spade free of the earth and slammed it down again. 'Heaven give me patience, for you'd try the patience of a saint, Georgina Perry! What made you pick on Duncan of all people?'

'I didn't!'

But she might just as well not have spoken. 'I suppose you found out long ago that he couldn't stand up to you? he went on nastily. 'Well, I can, Georgie Porgie, and I will. I'll make you rue this day for as long as you live, if it's the last thing I do!'

A shiver of fear ran up Georgina's spine. 'Why me?' she asked almost humbly. 'Why are you always so beastly to me? All right, I wanted to be the one to tel! you because— because I've never forgiven you for making everyone laugh at me, and this was the best opportunity I've ever had to hurt you as I was hurt then. But it wasn't anything to do with me that she preferred someone else to you! Anyone would! But you can't take it like a man, can you? Well, I don't believe your silly threats, so there!'

'So there?' There was a trace of cold steel in his amusement. 'How are you going to stop me taking it out on you?'

She faced up to him, swallowing down her momentary fear. 'I'll stay out of your way.'

'Much good that'll do you!'

'It'll be a pleasure!' she told him passionately. 'I don't like you at all—I never have!'

'Because I called your bluff when you made that poor little rabbit of a boy cry? Little girls should be taught early in life to keep their fists to themselves.'

'That was Duncan,' she retorted. 'Duncan Radcliffe. He's the man Jennifer is going to marry instead of you! He was a horrid boy, always pulling Jennie's hair and pinching her.' Her brow wrinkled as she remembered her earlier bewilderment. 'Only Jennie doesn't remember that now.'

'Probably because it never happened outside your imagination. It was most likely the excuse you invented in case anyone asked you why you'd punched the poor little devil. Usually you didn't bother with any excuse. You even took me on once, my girl, and you narrowly missed a good thrashing as a result. If I'd given it to you then, you might not stand in such need of one now!'

She was offended. 'Oh, I
hate
you!' she declared. 'You don't
know
anything about me at all, but you've always pretended you do, and it was never anything to my credit. Jennifer could do no wrong, but I could do no right, could I? Well, for what it's worth, you can do no right as far as I'm concerned either!'

'Pity.'

'And what does that mean?'

He brushed the mud off his fingers, ignoring her. She had a good view of his face in profile and she wondered, briefly, how she would have felt about him if she hadn't learned to hate him so many years before. He had a lot going for him in the way of looks. It was a good, strong face that turned slowly towards her and the eyes that met hers were well-shaped even if they were as cold as a winter's day.

'I'll tell you after I've seen Jennifer and heard her side of this affair. But I warn you, Georgina, if I find you're the cause of things having gone wrong between us, you'll pay for it. If you've messed

things up for me, I'll have you instead!'

Her mouth fell open. 'What on earth do you mean by that?'

'I mean,' he said with such restraint that she found herself believing every word of it, 'that you may not be my ideal woman, but you belong to the female sex, more or less, and that's all that's necessary for you to take Jennifer's place and come with me to Sri Lanka. I don't intend to go alone and you, my dear, will hate every moment of it, and that's good enough for me!'

'You're mad!' she gasped.

'If I am, it's because you've driven me round the bend,' he responded with a grunt. 'You've nobody to blame but yourself!'

'If you think—'

He put a hand on her shoulder, his fingers biting into her flesh. 'I don't think, I know. Come along, Georgina, we're going to have a talk with that sister of yours —
both
of us!' 'She's with Duncan,' Georgina protested. 'Can't you see, William, she was afraid to tell you herself? I wish she had! I thought I'd enjoy hurting you — '

'It won't be me who receives the lasting hurt!'

'No, but why hurt me? Why did you have to make them all laugh at me at that party? People went on about it years later, still quoting that stupid rhyme at me. It was so unfair!'

'Life is unfair. Besides, you deserved it and you know you did. A tomboy is one thing, but a termagant is another.'

'I never hit you!'

'Not for lack of trying.' He glanced down meaningly at her clenched fists. 'Are you going to try it now?'

Georgina forgot that discretion is the better part of valour. Her temper flared and she took careful aim, judging her distance nicely. She made exactly the right allowance for him to dodge her blow and caught him fair and square in the eye. At the moment of contact her anger seeped away and she withdrew the guilty fist to cover her mouth, her eyes wide with contrition.

'You dared me to!' she defended herself.

'I can't say I thought you'd do it all the same,' he muttered. He put a hand up to his eye and swore briefly. Georgina was horrified to see

that it was already discoloured and more than a little red.

‘I'm sorry, but you shouldn't have made me lose my temper. If we went inside I could bathe it for you.' The colour drained from her face. ‘It might look better then before your mother sees it.'

He was startled. ‘Does her opinion matter to you?'

Georgina nodded. ‘I like her,' she said simply. ‘I've always liked her. You're not at all like her.'

‘No,' he agreed with feeling. ‘I never allowed you to pull the wool over my eyes! Well, now she'll see you as you really are, won't she? As an intemperate, vicious little thug!'

‘Because I got the better of you? It was your own fault, only of course you won't admit it! You dared me to hit you, you know you did! I suppose you didn't think I would, that I would slap you or something silly like that, and now you don't like it because it was as good as anything you could do! A fine flush hit! It's made a pretty good mess of your face, let me tell you, and I'm completely unmarked!'

He uttered an exasperated laugh. ‘Only because I didn't hit you back!'

‘You might not have succeeded,' she pointed out. ‘I would have dodged out of the way!'

He turned to face her, reaching out for her and, with a gasp, she rushed out of arm's reach and ran down the garden path towards the gate and the comparative safety of the public highway. William caught her up halfway down the road to her parents' house.

‘Have you forgotten I'm coming to see Jennifer?' he asked her sweetly. ‘Or did you hope I'd give you time to tell her what to say? Not on your life, my girl! This time you won't shift the responsibility on to anyone else, least of all that long-suffering sister of yours. Jealousy is a very nasty thing and, if you allow it to, it will warp your whole nature. You ought to be grateful to me for making you face up to your motives for doing your best to ruin your sister's life. The only thing I want to know now is did you make Jennifer agree to marry me in the first place so that you could have your moment of triumph, or are you making her marry Duncan?'

‘I suppose you won't believe I've had nothing to do with anything Jennie chooses to do?'

'That would be stretching my credulity too far,' he agreed.

Georgina's eyes stung with tears. 'All right,
ask
Jennifer! I hope you'll feel as much a fool as you'll look when she's told you how wrong you are!'

'If
she tells me I'm wrong. I've known you both for years, remember, and you've always made Jennifer go your way. You won't do the same to me, so make up your mind to it, Georgina.'

'I wouldn't want to try,' she countered dryly. 'I've never pretended to know everything as you do. I wonder you mix with us lesser beings at all!'

William favoured her with a cold, blank look. 'Nor will that sharp tongue of yours help you. It doesn't cut any ice with me.'

'No,' she said, not without bitterness, 'it takes a pair of bright blue eyes to do that!'

His face flushed with anger. 'Georgina Perry, I'm warning you! Another crack like that and I'll put you across my knee in the middle of the road! It's more than time you learned to control that jealous temperament of yours! Is it Jennifer's fault that men find her more attractive than they do you?'

Georgina formed her lips into a smile. 'Do they?' she tempted him. 'How can you possibly know that?'

'Jennifer — ' He broke off, his eyes narrowing.

'Jennifer told you!' Georgina finished for him. 'Such a reliable source of information, I'm told. Still, it's something that you don't pretend to be privy to my love life as well as everything else —it might surprise you, it might even shatter a few illusions, and that would never do, would it?' She was rather proud of the note of mockery she had achieved, knowing he found it as objectionable as he did everything else about her.

'I have no illusions about either you or Jennifer,' he answered her. 'I've known you both far too long.'

'So you have,' she agreed with a light laugh. 'There's none so blind as he who will not see, though. Even the mighty William Ayres isn't always right! And, before you decide it's my vindictive nature that makes me say such a thing, it was your mother who said it first. She said it to comfort
me.
She said when I grew up I wouldn't care what you thought about me —'

'Why do you?' he interrupted her.

She thought of denying that she did, but William was no fool and she knew he would recognise it for the lie it was.

'I don't know,' she said at last. 'Because I'm a fool, I guess. Because you hurt me so badly and I wanted to change your mind about me.
I don't know!'

'Because you're jealous of Jennifer and you hated anyone to like her better than you. Isn't that the squalid little truth that's driven you on to seek your revenge on me all these years?'

'No, it had nothing to do with Jennifer,' she claimed, but she knew he wasn't even listening. There was an eager look to his face as he marched up the path by her side towards the front door. He had probably forgotten all about her, so intent was he on getting to Jennifer. For the first time she wondered if he were really in love with her sister and she was a little shocked that the question should arise in her mind at all. Why else would he have asked Jennifer to marry him?

Jennifer and Duncan were still sitting in the sitting-room where she had left them. They looked ill at ease when they saw her, glancing at her guiltily out of the corner of their eyes. Georgina felt the old, remembered irritation with her sister that she could never come out into the open and say what she meant. One always had to dig everything out of her bit by bit and, truth to tell, it was seldom worth the trouble when she did finally make her views known.

'Didn't you tell him?' Jennifer asked Georgina now. 'You said you would, Georgie. You said you'd enjoy it!'

'No, I didn't,' Georgina returned calmly.

'It's what you meant, though, you know you did! Why bring him here? I can't possibly see him now. You'll have to get rid of him, darling. He frightens me.'

Georgina turned her head to William who was still waiting in the hall. 'She says you frighten her,' she repeated. 'She'd prefer it if you went away.'

'Or is that what you would prefer?' he demanded. He took a step forward into the doorway, reaching out a hand to Georgina and spinning her out of his way. Unfortunately she lost her balance and collided with the rising Duncan. 'That's right, knock him out too!'

William jeered at her.

Jennifer gazed at him with stricken eyes. 'William, your eye! Did Georgie do that?'

'Who else?'

'Oh, how awful of her! I only asked her to —'

'Yes, what did you ask her to say to me?' he asked grimly.

Jennifer fluttered her lashes, glancing briefly at her sister. 'Oh, William, you know I wouldn't have hurt you for anything in the world! I can't help it if I'm easily persuaded, can I? Georgie could always make me say and do anything she wanted me to. I know I ought to stand on my own feet more, but you don't know what it's like when you have a big, overbearing sister like mine! She doesn't mean any harm, only she can't understand that anyone should want to do something else but carry out her commands. You mustn't be angry with her, William dear, or with me either.'