A Mortal Sin (13 page)

“Sorry,” Roy apologized for bumping into someone.

“So you should be,” the woman snapped in a high pitched, affected voice. “These Australians are so boorish, darling.”

This arrogant woman was dark-haired and so stunningly beautiful Daphne did not notice her partner at first.

Then shock caused the blood to pound in her ears like an artillery barrage. The stabbing pain in her chest felt so excruciating it squeezed the air from her lungs and made it hard to breathe. “Paul.” His name came out in a husky, tortured whisper, yet he heard.

“Daphne! Good Lord, what are you doing here?”

For some unexplained reason the orchestra stopped playing for a few moments, and a voice announced that there would be a five-minute break. Daphne couldn’t move. Her limbs were paralyzed.

“I’m working here.” No need to ask what he was doing. He wore an army uniform with a Major’s crown on his epaulettes.

“You know each other, Paul darling?”

“Yes.” His lips had a bitter downward twist. “Amelia, I’d like you to meet Daphne Clarke.” He paused for a moment and took a couple of deep breaths. “My little sister. Well only half, but even that’s too much.” His laugh sounded forced, devoid of humor.

“Hello, Amelia. Paul, this is Roy Jorgensen, a dear friend of mine.” Daphne linked arms with the young lieutenant who opened his mouth in surprise before hastily closing it again. “Come along, Roy where’s that drink you promised me?”

As they stepped away, Daphne turned her head ever so slightly. “I’m not your sister, Paul.”

The music started up again and Paul’s arm snaked out and grabbed her. “Dance?” He almost shoved Amelia at the lieutenant.

“Let me go. I’ll scream if you don’t.”

 He practically dragged Daphne into the middle of a moving throng.

“What the hell do you mean? I saw the photos and read the diary. Allison Clarke is my mother.”

“She’s not mine. Dad, I mean Frank and Allison Clarke are not my parents, natural or otherwise. They brought me up as theirs, I look upon them as my parents, but I’m a Clarke because that was my own father’s name. He was called Harry Clarke.”

Paul stiffened and she clearly heard his shocked intake of breath.

“You’re missing your step, Major, but don’t worry.” Her laugh sounded high-pitched, brittle. “I’m still not good enough for Sir Phillip Ashfield’s exulted son.”

 They were standing still now, not even pretending to dance. “Harry and Mabel Clarke were poor farmers. My mother died a few weeks after my birth. My father, badly crippled in the Great War, couldn’t live without her, so he shot himself.”

She twisted free and marched across the dance floor, her head held proudly, her eyes full of tears.

“Well!” Helen greeted her before she even reached the table. “What did you do to Sir Paul?”

“Sir Paul? Has he been knighted like his daddy?” Daphne wondered how she could even speak. She grabbed the glass Helen thrust in her hand, downing the contents in a couple of desperate gulps.

“Major Paul Ashfield hasn’t been knighted, but he’s so unobtainable, a lot of women out here call him that. There would hardly be a female in Singapore who wouldn’t jump at the chance of letting him put his shoes under their bed.”

“Really? I bet they don’t know what a despicable bastard he is,” Daphne retorted bitterly, shocked at the hateful words spilling out of her mouth.

“Hey, she’s exaggerating.” Bill pushed another glass towards her. “Drink this, you look like you need it.”

“I do.”

“Daphne. What is it? Are you ill?” Helen stopped her banter.

“No.”

Roy came back just then. “My God, what happened out there, Daphne? Say, are you all right? You look awful. What did the Major mean about you being his...”

“Please,” she interrupted him. “Forget it.”

Daphne forced some of the cold meat and salad down her throat, even though she nearly gagged on every mouthful. Her hand reached out for the champagne glass often. No one in the whole hotel could have laughed or danced more than Daphne Clarke did.

Paul was one of those at the long table. Why hadn’t she noticed him before? He made no attempt to come over. Often his face was up close to the beautiful Amelia’s, yet instinctively Daphne knew he watched every move she herself made.

The unaccustomed champagne made her light headed and reckless. She wanted to make sure he knew she was completely over him. When Roy pulled her close as they danced, she let him. He had been drinking steadily also and his speech sounded slurred as he whispered endearments in her ear.

“Beautiful Daphne, let’s go outside, huh?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Come on, a few kisses.” He leered, “maybe a little more.”

You’re an idiot, Daphne Clarke. It was her fault the nice young lieutenant had turned into a lecher. She had encouraged his advances by acting like a common tart.

“Let’s get back to the others,” she suggested, feeling far out of her depth.

“No, out here.” Double glass doors led to an enclosed conservatory, lavishly festooned with purple bougainvillea. The numerous pot plants gave it an outdoor garden effect.

“No, Roy, stop it.”

“Yes.” Even in his drunken state he was strong. She tried pulling away as he maneuvered them into the conservatory. His fingers biting into the flesh of her arms hurt.

“Please, don’t spoil things.”

“Daphne, beautiful flower.” His hands loosened their hold so he could kiss her. She pushed him as hard as she could and sent him sprawling into a huge, leafy fern.

“Well done.” Paul’s derisive tones caused her to swing around. “If you hadn’t, I would have.”

“Excuse me, I’d like to go inside,” she said coldly.

“Don’t put on that lady like act with me, not when you’ve been acting like a common little slut all night,” Paul snarled.

“You bastard.” She raised her hand to strike his handsome, sneering face.

It was a mistake. In no time his arms were around her, crushing her against him. His mouth captured hers in a brutal, punishing kiss.

Paul dragged his mouth away from hers, so he might push her away. Her low, almost agonized cry seared through his anger.

“Paul. Oh Paul.”

He didn’t let her go. Just held her close as she sobbed in such a terrible, heartbroken fashion he feared she might become ill.

“Don’t cry, Daphne, please.” Still the weeping continued. She was frail, almost wraithlike in his arms and he didn’t know what to say to ease her pain so he continued to hold her as tightly as he dared. The perfume haunting his dreams for so long filled his nostrils, and he could feel her soft shiny hair brushing against his face.

She was completely spent by the time the sobbing subsided and he used a hand at the back of her head to keep her face pressed against his chest. How good it felt to hold her close after so long apart.

“Where’s Roy?” she gulped.

“The lieutenant?”

She nodded.

“He’s gone back to your friends. We need to talk, but not here.”

“It’s no use, Paul. I can’t forgive you for what you did to me.”

“For God’s sake. I had to get out. What do you think it did to me to find out that the girl I loved was my sister? We’d slept together. I’d committed a mortal sin. Incest! Hell! What was I supposed to do? As if that wasn’t bad enough...”

“I could forgive you for that,” she cut him off. “It must have been a dreadful shock. If you hadn’t dashed off we could have sorted it all out.”

“I couldn’t face you or your family, especially after finding out about...”

“I dashed down to Melbourne to tell you, after we realized what had happened.

I could even forgive you for rushing into the arms of another woman within hours of leaving me, but Kitty. You took her to the bed we shared. That was the vilest act of all.”

“Daphne!”

She twisted free of him and walked away, leaving him to stand there. By the time he arrived back at his own table Daphne and her friends were leaving.

“I’m sorry about rushing you all off like this, just drop me off at home, I, I don’t feel well,” Daphne said in a wobbly, pain filled voice.

“We could have coffee somewhere,” Helen suggested obviously dying to find out what had happened on the terrace.

“I’d like to apologize for my disgraceful behavior before, Daphne, I don’t know what came over me.”

“Don’t worry about it, Roy, I acted like an idiot, too.”

If he asked her out again she would refuse him, it was better that way. They lapsed into silence. Even Helen, sitting next to them in the back of the car seemed disinclined to talk. Only Bill kept up a stream of frivolous chatter none of them cared about.

Chapter Ten

On Sunday afternoon Daphne and Molly sat on the lawn sipping cool drinks. A car pulled up and Paul stepped out. He wore civilian clothes, smart, lightweight grey slacks and an open necked white silk shirt.

“Good afternoon, ladies.”

“Hello. Am I supposed to know you?”

“Dr Gratton, isn’t it?” Paul gripped the large, almost mannish hand that was thrust at him.

“Yes.”

“I’m Paul Ashfield, Daphne would have mentioned me.”

“Afraid not. Khoo, another drink, please,” Molly instructed the young houseboy.

“A stengah, thanks.” Paul sat down in a cane chair. “How are you Daphne?”

“All right.” The words belied this. She looked pale, her skin almost transparent, and her eyes burned fever-bright.

“She’s been crying half the night.”

“Molly, you’re exaggerating,” Daphne protested.

“No, I’m not, my girl. You’re the one who broke her heart before, aren’t you?”

Paul felt his cheeks burn. This big, raw-boned woman made him feel like a naughty schoolboy. “Yes.”

“She’s already carrying deep scars from you. Don’t inflict any more will you. I’m off inside.”

“You don’t have to go, Molly,” Daphne told her friend.

“It’s time to clear the air once and for all, if you need me, Daph, holler.” Molly stood up.

Paul caught the look the doctor cast Daphne’s way and was shocked by the possessiveness of it.

“You’re too good to me, Molly.”

“Rot.”

“What do you want, Paul?”

“You.” He saw pain flare in her eyes. “Don’t look at me like that. My behavior was despicable, but I was shocked out of my mind. Not only did I think you were my sister, but I also discovered I was conceived as a result of rape.”

“What!” Daphne felt faint. If she hadn’t been sitting down she would have collapsed in a screaming heap on the ground.

“It’s true. Allison’s diary said Phillip Ashfield forced himself on her.”

“My God!” Shock shuddered all the way through her. “My God, Paul!” She wrung her hands in anguish. What torture her mother must have endured all those years ago.

 “I always felt there was some terrible secret in Mum’s past,” she finally whispered. “When she realized you’d read the diary, she burned it before the rest of us could even look at it.”

Paul left his chair so he could squat down beside her. “I’d cut my right arm off if it would undo the pain I inflicted on you. Please, can’t we start again? Let me take you somewhere tonight, I know of a good club.”

“I don’t think so, thanks. You don’t need me when half the girls in Singapore are lusting after you.”

“Damn it.” He slapped his forehead with an open palm. “You’ve been listening to scurrilous gossip. I didn’t rush into Kitty’s arms, either.”

“Liar,” she accused. “I went to Ian’s to find you, and Kitty answered the door in her nightgown.”

“I didn’t go to Ian’s place straight away. I swear it. I stayed at a hotel for a few days drinking myself senseless.”

“Kitty said you were in bed.”

“She bloody well lied.” He played his ace, the only one he had. “Tomorrow I’m going up to Kahang in Central Johore. The Australian 29th Battalion is near by.”

“Robbie?”

“Yes, I could arrange for you to see him.”

“How did you know about him?” she asked wide-eyed.

“I made enquiries about you, and one of the nurses at the 113th A.G.H proved most helpful.”

“Helen?”

“Yes. Robert Clarke, “A” Company, 29th Australian Infantry Battalion.” He nodded his thanks to the boy for the drink, took a quick sip and put it on the table. “Where’s Tom?”

“The Middle East somewhere. He’s in the Artillery. How long have you been here?”

“Since the end of July. Before that,” he grimaced, “deskbound in England.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, my father tried to keep me there. I volunteered to come here, finally, couldn’t stomach a desk job when so many other chaps were getting killed. Right after I left you, I went to Singapore and worked here for a while. I couldn’t go back to England and face the old man, not so soon after what I’d found out. Anyway, I’ve got local knowledge the army can use, so when I found out a school chum of mine was a colonel out here it was easy. He pulled strings and my father couldn’t do a damn thing to stop it. So here I am.”

“Did you tell your father what you’d found out about Mum?”

“I wasn’t ever going to speak to him again, but he had a heart attack. They thought he might die and sent for me. What could I do? I did ask him. You know what he said?”

“Tried to lie his way out of it, I suppose?”

“No, he didn’t. He said he loved her. No woman had ever spurned his advances before, so in the heat of the moment he lost control. He was sorry afterwards, regretted it bitterly ever since.”

“What a weak excuse. How Mum must have suffered. Yet she’s not bitter.”

“Will you come with me tomorrow, Daphne?”

“Yes, you know I will, unless Molly needs me.”

“She spends most Mondays on hospital visits.”

“You have been checking up.”

“And tonight, you’ll come out with me? We could go for a quiet meal, if you prefer. You’re the religious one. Forgiveness is scattered right through the Bible if I remember correctly.”

“Helen says the nurses call you Sir Paul. You don’t go out with anyone below the rank of captain. I’m not even in the army, not English either, so how would I rate?”

“You’re being bloody stupid. For God’s sake, you want me to shave my head and don sackcloth. Is that it?”