The Adventurers (25 page)

"And you're not?"

"No. Besides, I haven't finished yet."

She moved closer to him. He sensed her hand on the rough fabric of his trousers. Quickly he tore at his buttons. He felt the hot moistness of her hand. "Caroline!"

A strange little smile came to her lips. "You're not afraid, are you?"

"What is there to be afraid of?"

This time he screamed aloud with the pain. Her long nails tore into his flesh, then she was at the open door. "Too bad, Dax."

He didn't answer.

Again he sensed the silent sound of her secret laughter. "You didn't think I'd be as easy as a stableman's daughter, did you?"

Then she was gone, and he was alone. He felt the surge of anger rising inside him as he walked over to the wash-stand and turned on the water. Sergei would collapse with laughter if he ever learned what had happened.

Angrier now than ever, he dried himself quickly and went outside. For a moment he stood looking back at the dark villa, then turned toward the road. Cannes was only a half-mile away. There were bound to be girls there. There always were. To hell with her. Let her practice her black teasing arts on Sergei, or on her brother for that matter. They might be civilized enough to tolerate her petty amusements.

A shadow suddenly materialized from the darkness and fell into step beside him. He did not have to look to know who it was.

"Where are you going?"

"Was it you outside the poolhouse?" he asked angrily.

Fat Cat laughed. "You ought to know better. Do you think I would let you hear me?"

"Who was it then?"

"Your father."

"My father?" Dax's anger evaporated. "Did he know I was inside?"

"Si. That is why I am here. He wishes to see you at once."

Dax turned and silently followed Fat Cat back to the house. His father looked up as he came into the room. "What were you doing with that girl in the poolhouse?" he asked in a harsh whisper.

Dax stared at his father. It was one of the few times he had ever seen him so angry. He didn't answer.

"Are you crazy?" His father was distraught. "Do you know what would happen if you were caught with her? Do you think the baron would be willing to make a loan to the despoiler of his daughter?"

Dax still didn't answer.

His father slumped suddenly into a chair. "Everything would be lost. The whole negotiation would collapse. Everything we fought for and bled for would be gone. And all because of your stupidity."

Dax looked at his father and for the first time he noticed the trembling in his hand, the age lines and exhaustion in his face. He walked over to him. "I'm sorry, Papa," he said softly, "but there is nothing to be upset about I didn't touch her."

His father's tension eased. The one real truth of his existence was the honesty that lay between them. He knew his son would not lie to him.

"You are right, I was stupid," Dax said. "It will not happen again."

His father reached out and took his hand. "Dax, Dax. In how many worlds must you learn to live because of me?"

Dax felt the agony and fragility of the man in his touch. Suddenly there was a sadness and an understanding in him that had not been there before. He bent down and pressed his lips to his father's soft dark cheek. "I want to live only in your world, my father. I am your son."

It had been the first time that Dax realized his father was dying.

CHAPTER 9

There was no pain, although Jaime Xenos knew that he was dying. He looked up into the eyes of the priest. There was so much he wanted to explain. But the words merely flitted across the screen of his mind and never found their way to his tongue.

He was tired. He had never felt so tired. He turned his head on the pillow and closed his eyes. The drone of the priest faded. Perhaps he would find his voice again after he had rested. There was no fear. Only a heavy kind of sadness. There was so much to be done, so much he could still do. But now it was over. Time was coming to a stop.

Dax. The word seemed to burn its way through his mind. Alone. Dax. He was so young. And so alive. There were so many things he had not yet taught him. So many things the boy would need to know. The world was not solved by the sheer physical energy of youth alone. He wanted to tell him that. And much more. But it was too late.

Much too late. He slept.

Dax crossed the room toward the doctor.

"He is sleeping," the doctor said. "It is a good sign."

Dax followed the doctor out of the room, leaving the priest alone with his father. Fat Cat was waiting just outside the door. "How is he?"

"The same." Dax shook his head. He turned to the doctor. "When ... ?"

"Sometime tonight. Perhaps tomorrow morning. No one can tell."

"There is no chance?"

"There is always a chance," the doctor said, knowing as he spoke that there was none.

Marcel came up the staircase. "A reporter from Paris Soir is on the telephone."

"Tell him there is no news."

"That is not why he called."

Dax looked at him. "Why, then?"

Marcel did not look at him. "They want to know if you will continue to play polo."

Dax's face clouded. Angrily he clenched his fist. "Is that all they have to think about? A great man is dying and they worry about their stupid games?"

He remembered when the reporters had first given him the name "The Savage." It was after the game with Italy when he had ridden two of the Italians into the dirt and one of them, seriously hurt, had been taken to the hospital.

They had clustered around him later, asking questions:

"How do you feel about the two men who were injured?"

"Bad luck," he had answered casually. "This is no game for men who can't keep their seats."

"It sounds like you don't care what happens to them."

Dax had looked at the reporter. "Why should I?" he asked. "The same thing could happen to me every time I go out there."

"But it didn't happen to you," another reporter said. "And it always seems to happen to someone on the other team."

Dax's voice turned cold. "What do you mean?"

"It seems strange," the reporter had continued, "that you always become involved in an accident when the other team is about to score. And they are always the ones to be hurt, not you."

"Are you suggesting that I deliberately set about to injure them?"

"No." The reporter hesitated. "But—"

"I play to win," Dax interrupted, "and that means not allowing the other team to score if I can prevent it. I am not responsible for the lack of horsemanship of the other riders."

"There is such a thing as sportsmanship."

"Sportsmanship is a word for losers. I'm only interested in winning."

"Even if you kill someone doing it?" asked the first reporter.

"Even if I kill myself," Dax retorted.

"But this is a game," the reporter said in a horrified voice, "not a battlefield."

"How do you know?" Dax asked. "Have you ever been out there with a thousand pounds of horse and man charging down on you? Just try it once. You'd change your opinion."

He remembered that the telephone had rung that night while he was at dinner. It was one of the reporters he had spoken to that afternoon. "Did you know the Italian died in the hospital a little while ago?"

"No."

"Is that all you have to say?" the reporter had asked. "Not even that you're sorry?"

Suddenly Dax had been angry. "What good would it do? Would my words bring him back to life?" He had slammed down the receiver.

How strange that he should recall it all now that his own father was dying. Nothing could change that. Not his hurried return from London after the All-France match with England. Not even the news he brought about the shipping contract, which meant more than anything else. No, it had all come too late.

The only change that the resultant publicity had made was in the crowds. The stands were all sold out for the next game, and there was a murmur from the stands as he came riding out onto the field. He looked up in surprise, then glanced over at Sergei riding next to him.

The Russian smiled. "You're a star. They all came out to see you."

Dax stared at the crowd. They were gawking at him with a curious expectancy. He felt a cold shiver go through him. "They came to see me kill someone."

Sergei looked up at the crowd, then back at Dax. The Russian's mouth settled into grim lines. "Or be killed."

They were almost satisfied. Toward the end of the fourth chukker there was a pileup in the center of the field, and three horses went down, with Dax in the middle. There was no sound as the other two got to their feet and started off the field. But a low soft murmur swelled up as Dax did. Startled for a moment he glanced at them, then turned quickly away to help his pony up.

The horse stood there shaking, its sides heaving, as Dax slowly rubbed its neck. "We fooled them that time, didn't we, boy?"

Then Fat Cat had come onto the field with another pony. A faint smattering of applause began as he lifted himself into the saddle. Mockingly he tipped his cap, and the crowd began to roar their approval.

Bewildered, he pulled up beside Sergei. "I don't get it."

"Don't try." Sergei laughed. "You're a hero now."

Even the newspapers recognized this, and by the end of that year they were pushing him for the All-France team. He became the youngest eight-goal handicap player ever to ride onto the field. Just a month shy of his eighteenth birthday.

But how empty it all seemed now as he waited for his father to die. Everything. All the plans that had seemed so important then. He remembered one night at school, along toward the end of the term. The three of them had been in the room together.

He had leaned back in the chair and put his feet up on the desk. "How do you think you made out in the exams, Sergei?"

Sergei's handsome face had clouded over. "I don't know. That last examination was rough."

Dax nodded. He looked at Robert, though there was no need to ask him. For almost three years now he had stood at the head of the class. He was beginning to pack away his books. "How do you feel?"

Robert shrugged his shoulders. "Relieved," he said cautiously, "and yet a little sad." He looked around the room. "In a way I hate to leave this place."

"Shit!" Sergei had shouted explosively. "I'll be glad to get out!"

Dax smiled. "What are your plans?"

"What plans? There are no more free schools for me. No more scholarships. I guess they figure the Commies are in power for good, so who needs a White Russian?"

"What are you going to do then?" Robert had asked. "Go to work?"

"At what?" Sergei made a face. "What the hell can I do? Get a job like my father? Be a doorman?"

"You'll have to do something," Robert had said.

"Maybe I'll go to Harvard like you," Sergei replied sarcastically. "Or join Dax at Sandhurst. But who would get me an appointment? My father the general?"

Robert fell silent. Sergei watched him for a moment, then apologized, his voice softening. "I didn't mean to be nasty."

"That's all right," Robert replied in a low voice.

"Actually, I've already decided what I'm going to do," Sergei said, his voice lightening.

"You have?"

"I'm going to marry a rich American. They seem to go for princes."

Dax began to laugh. "But you're not a prince. Your father is a count."

"What the hell's the difference?" Sergei asked. "To them a title is a title. You remember that one at the party the other night? When I took it out she looked at it and said in an awed voice, 'I never saw a royal one before.'

" 'Does it look any different?' " I asked.

" 'Oh, yes. I'd know the difference in a minute. The tip is purple. Royal purple!' "

When the laughter had died down, Robert turned toward Dax. "What about you?"

"I guess Sandhurst," he said. "I got the appointment, and my father wants me to go."

"I think it's a damn shame!" Robert said angrily. "The only reason they gave you an appointment is because they want you to play polo for them!"

"What difference does that make?" Sergei asked. "I only wish they'd asked me."

"I'll bet it was my uncle who arranged it," Robert said. "I saw the way he watched your playing when he came to that game last year."

"My father thinks it may help relations between England and Corteguay. Maybe we'll get that shipping line after all."

"I thought it was all set when my father formed the company. It cost over five million dollars to obtain those shipping rights."

"Only the ships never came. It seems that Greek gambler had leased his ships to the British before he got word that the deal with Corteguay was set."

"Somebody was double-crossed."

"Your father and mine. Yours especially. Actually all your father ever got for that five million was an import-export license guaranteeing him five-percent commission on all freight. It turned out to be worth nothing since there was no shipping."

They fell silent for a moment. Though they were both thinking the same thing, neither of them spoke about it. It was much too obvious.

It was Sergei who broke the silence. "We still have this summer, ten games between now and fall. That means at least forty parties, forty different girls to fuck! Anything can happen."

"I know what will happen."

"What?"

The beginnings of a smile appeared around Dax's mouth. "You'll wind up with a royal purple clap!"

CHAPTER 10

The consul came into his office walking slowly, leaning on his cane. "Good morning, Marcel."

Marcel looked up from the newspaper he was folding carefully and placing in the exact center of the consul's desk. "Good morning, your excellency."

Jaime glanced down at the newspaper. "Did they win?"

Marcel smiled. "Of course. And Dax again scored the most points. He is a hero. I understand the whole team is being allowed to stay over for the long weekend."

The consul sat down behind the desk and glanced at the newspaper. It was lavish with praise for his son. He shook his head. "I don't know whether I like this. All this attention. It's not good for a young boy."