Bewitched (Bantam Series No. 16) (18 page)

“She is yours,” he said. “Keep her safe.”

“I will do that,” the Marquis said.

The two men shook hands. Saviya led the Marquis to her caravan.

There were two white horses to draw it, and he climbed up and sat beside her on the front seat. But there were no reins: the horses were led by the Gypsies.

The men playing the violins went ahead and they were followed by the women carrying what looked to the Marquis like bundles and baskets.

The caravan followed and, just as they turned out of sight amongst the trees, the Marquis looked back to see the Voivode standing alone by the fire in the deserted camp.

He leant on his staff and looked very distinguished and at the same time lonely—a King of a very small community, but nevertheless—a King!

The procession wended its way through the trees where it was too dark for the Marquis to see the way. Then finally they came to a stand-still.

The horses were taken from the shafts and, still sitting in the front of the caravan, the Marquis and Saviya watched the women light a small fire.

Those who were carrying the bundles laid them down on the ground beneath the leafy branches of a tree, just out of reach of the heat from the flames.

They laid rugs over the bundles and scattered the flower petals which filled their baskets. They were in every hue of red, pink, white, orange, yellow, and mauve.

Then the Gypsy women danced around the fire, at first slowly and then their movements growing wilder, and more ecstatic.

In the light of the flames their figures had a strange primitive beauty until, to the music of the violins, they moved away into the wood.

The musicians went last and then they too vanished into the darkness of trees.

Saviya stepped down from the caravan to stand beside the fire staring after them.

The Marquis joined her.

The last notes of the violins seemed to hover on the air and then there was silence.

“Did you notice,” Saviya asked, her voice very low and lost, “they did not ... look at me? They will no longer ... speak to me.”

There was so much unhappiness in her voice that the Marquis put his arms around her.

She no longer wore the crown of jewels in which she had been married, and her hair was against his shoulder. He put his hand up very gently to stroke it.

“I am ... nobody!” she murmured, “I am not even a ... witch!”

“You are my wife,” the Marquis said in a deep voice, “and you have bewitched me, Saviya, from the first moment I saw you. I am caught in your spell and now I can never escape.”

He heard her give a deep sigh. She raised her face to his and her eyes were very dark and mysterious in the light of the moon.

“Are you quite sure that it is ... enough?” she asked. “I have so little to give you. I do not even now know myself.”

“But I know you,” the Marquis answered. “I know that you are everything I wanted in a woman; everything I desire in my wife. Everything I shall love, adore and worship for the rest of my life.”

His words made her quiver and very gently, just as the music had started, soft as the ripple of a raindrop on a smooth pool, he kissed her, holding her against his heart.

Then as he felt a sudden flame rise within her to echo the flame in himself, his lips grew fierce and more demanding.

Wildly, with an elation that was indescribable, he was kissing her until it was impossible to think of anything save that they were one with each other.

Then as the moon rose higher over the trees and the embers of the fire were red, they lay together on the flower-petalled couch and there was only the whisper of their love.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The Marquis rose very quietly so as not to awaken Saviya.

Asleep she looked very young, and he saw the expression on her face was one of intense happiness.

He looked down at her and thought that no-one could be more breathtakingly lovely.

Her eyes were dark half-crescents against the ivory of her skin and her black hair with its blue lights fell over the pillow and her naked shoulders.

They had moved into the caravan just before dawn. A slight breeze had broken the warmth of the night and rustled in the leaves of the trees.

It had been a night of enchantment such as the Marquis had never believed possible.

There was magic in the moonlight, making Saviya look very ethereal, yet also a siren, a Lorelei.

And as their desire for each other swept them away into the heights of ecstasy where there were only the peaks of passion, they were no longer humans, but as gods.

The Marquis put on the long robe which Hobley had brought him when he had been ill in the caravan, and walking through the open door he descended the steps.

The sun illuminated the small clearing and he realised that it was a part of the wood that he had not visited since he was a boy.

Just beyond where the caravan was resting there was a forest pool surrounded by trees. There were willows overhanging the still water, their leaves almost gold against the dark fir and the silver birch.

Kingcups and wild iris were brilliant yellow on the edge of the pool, and the mosses and lichen beneath the trees were saffron and jade.

It was as lovely in the sunlight as it had been mysterious and unearthly beneath the moon.

Now the Marquis saw that Hobley had already relit the fire which had died away during the night, and it was burning brightly, while beyond it was the flower-strewn couch which the Gypsies had made for them.

On it, thrown negligently among the petals, were the jewelled necklaces he had taken from Saviya’s neck.

He had loosed her hair, to kiss the scented silk of it and she quivered at the touch of his hands on her body.

‘Had there ever been such happiness?’ the Marquis asked himself now.

“Good-morning, Hobley,” he said aloud.

“Good-morning, M’Lord.”

“Did you have much trouble in finding us?” the Marquis asked with a smile.

“It took me some time, M’Lord, but I’ve brought to Your Lordship the wine for luncheon, it is cooling in the pool.”

“Is the water cold?” the Marquis asked.

“Just fresh, M’Lord.”

“Then I think I will try it.”

He walked towards the pool as he spoke and pulling off his robe, plunged in, finding the water, as Hobley had said, fresh and invigorating and not too chill.

When the Marquis had finished swimming Hobley shaved him, and when finally the valet was no longer required, he went back to the House.

The Marquis sat for a little while staring into the flames of the fire and then he rose and went to go into the caravan.

He sat down on the edge of the low bed looking at Saviya who was still asleep. But after a moment she opened her eyes.

There was no mistaking the radiance that lit up her face and as the Marquis bent towards her she made an inarticulate murmur and put her arms round his neck.

“It is ... true!” she whispered. “I was afraid last night must be only a ... wonderful dream!”

“Was it wonderful for you, my darling?”

“It was such unbelievable happiness, I did not know that even love could be so completely perfect.”

His lips found hers. Then as he felt her soft and yielding beneath him, his kiss grew more passionate and more demanding until everything was forgotten except their need of each other...

It was a long time later that Saviya hurried down the steps of the caravan towards the fire.

“You must be hungry,” she said. “Only the worst type of wife would allow her husband to be so long without food.”

“I was hungry for something less material!” the Marquis answered and he smiled as Saviya blushed.

She busied herself breaking the eggs Hobley had brought them and cooked them skilfully over the fire.

But all the time she was aware that the Marquis was watching her, and she was conscious that she wore only a silk wrap and her hair was falling loose on either side of her small face.

“You make me shy,” she protested.

“I adore you when you are shy.”

She waited on him and he ate all she gave him. Then as she laid aside the plates and the cooking pans he said:

“Leave those for Hobley, Saviya. I want you.”

She smiled at him provokingly.

“Are you commanding me?”

“Of course! Are you defying me?”

^<4
What would you do if I did?”

“Carry you away into the dungeons of my Castle and torture you until you surrendered yourself completely and unreservedly. I love you to distraction, my lovely, but I will be your master.”

She looked at him uncertainly, not quite sure if he was joking or serious.

“Come here, my precious,” he said softly.

And then she ran into his arms like a child seeking safety.

As the hours passed they lay in the sun-shine talking of themselves and their love.

Late in the day when it grew hotter, the Marquis persuaded Saviya to swim in the pool.

As she moved across it he thought that nothing could be more lovely than the perfection of her white body beneath the silver ripples.

It made her seem part of the trees, the irises and the darkness of the woods. When finally she came from the pool, the water glistening on her body like dew-drops, he held her close as if he was afraid of losing her.

“I am convinced now,” he said in his deep voice, “that you are a wood-nymph and if I do not hold on you will vanish like the morning mist, and I shall never be able to find you again.”

She pressed herself against him, her arms round his neck and he kissed her at first gently, then fiercely, demandingly, until finally he picked her up in his arms to carry her back to the flower-strewn couch on which they had spent the night.

It was late in the afternoon when the Marquis said:

“We must go now, my darling.”

“Go? Go where?”

“Home,” he replied. “We are to be married.”

“We are married!”

“We are, I agree, joined together irrevocably,” the Marquis answered. “But at the same time I wish to marry you, Saviya, according to the Law of England, and receive the blessing of the Church—my Church, which I hope one day will also be yours.”

She was silent for a moment, her head bent a little as if she searched for words. Then she said:

“As you know, the ceremony yesterday when we intermingled our blood is to me sacred and unites us in a manner which means that I belong to you and could never belong to anyone else. But for you it is different?”

“There is no difference,” the Marquis said firmly.

“But there is,” she answered. “You do not acknowledge the Gypsy laws which for me are binding, even though I am no longer a Gypsy. And because of your position in the world, because you are of such importance, it is best that you could, if you wished it, be free to marry a woman of your own class.”

“You are my class! We are both equally well bred,” the Marquis said. “I always believed it even before the Voivode told us his tale.” He lifted her chin with his fingers until she was looking up at him.

“Have you forgotten,” he asked, “that when you were exchanged for the dead baby, the Voivode said that you were the child of a nobleman?”

“I am still nameless—still nobody!” Saviya replied miserably. “Let me stay with you because I am yours, but it is best if I do not become your wife according to English Law, so that your friends must acknowledge my position even while they despise me for myself.”

“No-one will despise you as far as I am concerned,” the Marquis said with a hard note in his voice.

“I can never forget,” Saviya said, “the way your cousin referred to me. He was only speaking aloud what your friends and acquaintances will have been thinking even though they are too tactful or too frightened to say it to your face.”

“I have told you before, and I must say it again,” the Marquis said, “that I am not in the least interested what anyone should say behind my back. I honour and respect you. You are, in every way, all I have ever wished my wife to be.”

He saw the troubled expression in Saviya’s eyes and added:

“I am not prepared to argue about this, Saviya. You obeyed the Voivode and you will obey me. You are mine and it is for me to make the decisions which affect our lives.”

Her eyes were on his and he felt that she was glad that he was so masterful, and that she must obey his authority as she had obeyed the Chief of her tribe.

“I will do ... anything you ask of me,” she said softly after a moment.

And because she was so pliant and so sweet, the Marquis crushed her against him and kissed her until the world whirled around them and once again everything was forgotten but themselves.

When they were dressed they walked a little way through the wood and found on the bridle-path the Marquis’s Phaeton.

He helped Saviya into it, took the reins from the groom who jumped up behind. They moved forward.

The Marquis could only drive slowly until they were clear of the trees, but when they reached the Park he tooled his horses swiftly with an expertise that made Saviya look at him appreciatively.

He knew she was delighted with the horse-flesh he kept in his stables, and he planned that as soon as they returned from their honeymoon he would buy her some horses for her own. He knew exactly the type of Arab-bred animal which would suit her.

Ruckley House looked exquisite in the late afternoon sunshine.

Already the shadows were growing longer on the green lawns and the flowers were great patches of colour. The house itself glowed warm and welcoming as a jewel.

The flag was flying on the roof-tops and Saviya looked up at it with a little smile.

“Your flag!” she said, remembering how angry he had been when Jethro had flown it in his absence.

“Our flag!” he corrected, “over our house, my darling.”

“Can I really own a part of anything so beautiful?” Saviya asked.

“Everything I have is yours,” the Marquis replied.

“I think I have always longed for a house of my own,” Saviya told him. “Perhaps it was some forgotten instinct or a part of my blood, but for me home has always meant a place where I could stay and not have to move on.”

She gave a little laugh that was half a sigh.

“Perhaps really I have never been a Gypsy at heart. I only thought I was. I am beginning to understand now so many things about myself which puzzled me.”

“I want to know everything you feel and everything you think,” the Marquis said. “I cannot bear that any part of you should not be mine.”

“It is all ... yours,” Saviya whispered.

The Marquis drew up at the front door with a flourish.

As they both alighted from the Phaeton he held out his hand to Saviya and they walked up the steps hand in hand.

She was wearing the elaborate, exquisitely embroidered Gypsy dress in which she had been married, and the Marquis had fastened the jewelled necklaces around her neck and the jewelled ear-rings in her small ears.

Only her head was bare, because the crown in which she had married was part of the Kalderash treasure and was used for every wedding which took place within the tribe.

“There are three gentlemen waiting for Your Lordship,” Bush said, as they reached the Hall. “They are in the Salon.”

“Visitors?” the Marquis asked sharply.

“Captain Collington brought them, M’Lord. They arrived just after luncheon and I told them that Your Lordship was expected later in the afternoon.”

The Marquis smiled.

“Charles is here!” he said to Saviya. “I wrote to him yesterday to tell him I was alive. I felt that he would be unable to resist coming to make sure for himself.”

Still holding Saviya’s hand the Marquis walked towards the Salon, and as the door was opened for them by a footman, they entered.

There were three men at the far end of the room and as the Marquis and Saviya entered they sprang to their feet.

“Fabius, I have never been so glad of anything in my whole life, as I was to get your note!” Charles Collington exclaimed.

He hurried across the room to the Marquis as he spoke, both hands outstretched.

“You are all right?” he added, the Marquis’s hand in his.

“I have completely recovered, thanks to Saviya,” the Marquis answered, “but it was a near thing.”

“His Lordship told me how wonderful you have been,” Charles Collington said to Saviya.

She smiled at him as he lifted her hand to his lips.

“I and all of Fabius’s friends owe you a great debt of gratitude,” he said with great sincerity.

While he was speaking, the Marquis went towards the two other gentlemen standing in front of the fireplace.