Dorothy Eden (63 page)

She was being hypnotised into believing them. Part of her experiences had been natural simply explained things and the other part the result of an over-wrought imagination. That was the truth of it.

There was only one person she knew who would disagree and that was Henrietta Conroy who loved melodrama and persuaded herself that even Ethel, bashful and clumsy and giggling, must have her private life. As a consequence Henrietta’s support really counted for nothing. She was alone.

“Poor Antonia,” said Iris tenderly. “We’re all talking about you, darling. Let’s talk about something else. Are we all going to the flower festival? I don’t think anyone has told you much about this, Antonia. There’s a floral procession in the afternoon and at night a dance. There’ll be literally millions of flowers, I believe.”

“Christchurch is the garden city of New Zealand,” Joyce Halstead said in her slightly geographical manner. “You want to see the gardens in the suburbs. Each house has one and of course they try to outdo one another. Then there’s the right kind of climate—”

“When I go to my rooms later,” Doctor Bealey interrupted, his eyes on Antonia, “I’d be delighted to drive you through the better parts of Christchurch. It’s very English, I’m told.”

“Splendid idea. Splendid,” Simon said, for once looking at the company with bright eager eyes. “We haven’t had time to take Antonia around at all. Iris and I—well, apart from everything else we’ve been busy with this place.”

So poor Simon was a little jealous of Doctor Bealey. He was jumping at the suggestion that his attention should be diverted from Iris—if it had ever been seriously on her. Poor Simon. It wasn’t comfortable loving someone as possessively as that, especially when one was a little slow and simple and one’s beloved quick and restless and impatient. For Simon’s sake, she thought, she would go with Doctor Bealey. But the proposal gave her no pleasure at all. She would be glad to be home again.

Doctor Bealey drove well. His car was new. He had only had it four days and had gone up to Mount Cook to run it in. It was coincidence that he should have met Iris and Simon there.

“Iris told me she had met you in Auckland,” Antonia said.

“Yes. At a party. I remembered her, of course. One does. She’s so distinctive with that pale hair. She isn’t beautiful, but what is it about her?”

Antonia knew what he meant. Iris’s small sharply featured face with its crown of pussy willow hair hadn’t beauty so much as a kind of force, a compelling quality that made one certainly remember her.

“At that time she was nursing old Miss Mildmay and she was pretty tired. She had insisted on doing the nursing herself, I believe, although it was a hopeless case.”

There was a picture in Antonia’s mind of the grave in Auckland and the rain-spattered card ‘In loving and sorrowful memory. Iris.’ That was another role for Iris, and one in which Antonia had difficulty in imagining her. But if she had nursed Aunt Laura with devotion she deserved something better than a husband whom she didn’t love. For Antonia found it quite impossible to imagine Iris returning Simon’s passionate devotion.

They drove round the bay with its curling white waves, and across the flat marshy farmland towards the city. Ralph Bealey proved a well-informed companion. He could name all the native trees in the gardens, the rata, the matapo, the plumed toi toi, the clematis spreading its tendrils over garden walls, and the beautiful drooping crimson fuchsias with their blossoms shaped like ballet dancers. But the gardens were predominantly English with their rosebeds and smooth lawns and borders of marigold, phlox and mignonette. There were flowers everywhere as if the early settlers had been more concerned with their seeds and rose cuttings than their livestock and household goods.

Antonia told herself she should have enjoyed the drive, but when they reached the heart of the city and the cathedral spire laid its pointed shadow over the square she sighed with relief. What was it about this dark, serious, probably brilliant young man that she didn’t like, that was even slightly repellent to her? She could never forget the queer unreasonable thrill of fear that had gone through her when she had opened her eyes the previous afternoon and had seen him bending over her. It was as if a nightmare had become real—yet what was there in the least nightmarish about this suave well-mannered young man? It wasn’t fair to judge him from that distorted half-awake impression she had of him.

“If anyone is unkind to you,” he said suddenly, “you must tell me.”

Antonia looked at him in astonishment.

“What a funny thing to say.”

“I mean it.”

“But apart from being old enough to look after myself, why should I tell you?”

“Because I’m concerned for you. I like you.”

Antonia was intensely uncomfortable.

“That’s nice of you. But—”

He laid his hand on her knee.

“No buts, my dear. I liked you the moment I saw you in the plane the other day.”

Antonia drew quickly away, making her sudden animation an excuse to move herself from his hand.

“Was it coincidence that you were on the same plane that day?”

His brows lifted.

“But, of course. A lucky one, but a coincidence nevertheless. Did you think I was following you? But how should I have known of your arrival quite apart from who you were?”

His logic defeated her. And yet, stubbornly, she was not convinced. He smiled his flat smile that neither lifted nor turned down the corners of his mouth.

“I admit I found out later who you were. That’s why I was so elated at meeting Iris and Simon at Mount Cook. Another coincidence. Doesn’t all this seem significant to you?”

“I can’t see any particular significance in it,” Antonia said dampingly. “Thank you for the drive.”

“Wait a minute, you’re lunching with me, of course.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t. I have an appointment.”

“Really?”

“Why do you suppose I should say that if I hadn’t?” she asked in irritation that he didn’t believe her lie.

“Then I shall drive you home after it. I’ll meet you here.”

There seemed no alternative to that. Antonia weakly agreed. She had the feeling that it was useless to try to deceive Doctor Ralph Bealey. Somehow he would be shadowing her, aware of what she was doing. In spite of her common sense she couldn’t shake off the instinct that beneath his suave exterior there was something queer, something perhaps perverted, or even evil.

She walked about the streets absently, looking into shop windows, reading names on glass doors. The city was too new to have any real interest or atmosphere. There were no dark mysterious archways, no blind beggars in doorways, no unexpected treasures behind dusty window panes. It was all new, clean, thriving and safe. Completely safe. Yet the discomfort she had felt in Ralph Bealey’s presence persisted, and she felt more uneasy and apprehensive than she had ever felt in a continental city or in dark London lanes.

When suddenly she saw the name Dougal Conroy, LLB, Barrister and Solicitor, on a brass nameplate an impulse took her quickly into the office.

A thin, middle-aged woman with a foxy face and heavily rimmed glasses was coming out of an inner room.

She said “Yes?” in a high sharp voice. “Did you want Mr. Conroy?”

“Yes, please. I’m afraid I haven’t an appointment. My name’s Antonia Webb.”

She was conscious that the woman gave her a sharp interested look. Then she took her neatly dressed flat body into the inner room again. A moment later she emerged with Dougal behind her.

“Antonia?” His voice held a question, almost an apprehensive one.

She laughed. “It’s all right. It’s just necessary for me to have a lunch appointment, so I wondered if it could be with you.”

“Certainly.” He looked at his watch. She was aware of the slightly pursed mouth of the woman before she slipped into her own room. Good heavens, did all these women run Dougal’s life for him?

“Dougal, for heaven’s sake don’t be polite about it! If it isn’t convenient, say so.”

“Of course it’s convenient.” But he still looked sober, his eyes searching hers. “Is there anything wrong?”

“No, nothing at all. I needed a lunch appointment. I’m using you. Do you mind?”

He didn’t answer that. He said, “How’s your ankle ?”

“Oh, almost well.”

“You’re on it too much, I should think. I can’t give you long because I have to go to court, but I usually have a sandwich about now.”

“Then that’s what we’ll have. A sandwich and a glass of milk.” She lowered her voice. “Who was that woman?”

“Miss Fox. My secretary.”

“How delicious! She looks
exactly
like her name—as if she goes preying on chicken runs at night?”

He smiled. “Can’t you be serious?”

“And you’re her special chicken, I can see that. Look out she doesn’t eat you one day. Yes, of course I can be serious. But not now, please. I’ve got to laugh or go nuts.”

“What’s happened?”

“Oh, nothing, really. It’s all inside me, somehow. I think Iris must be right. I’m a schizophrenic or something.”

She insisted that they have nothing more than the sandwich and milk, and perched on stools over a glass-topped table she told him she had to meet Doctor Bealey again in an hour.

“I wish you’d go home again,” he said emphatically. She looked at him in disbelief.

“To England?”

“England, if you like. Australia, America. Anywhere but here.”

“Dougal!” The terrible thing was that he looked so in earnest over it, as if he acutely wanted her to go away. “Is this for my good or yours?”

“I don’t know how it could conceivably be for mine.”

“Ah, but it could. Your mother told me you didn’t like red-headed women. I suppose my hair is red.” She held a lock in front of her eyes and stared at it mournfully. “It could be called a rich brown.”

“Antonia! This is no time for being coy! What I’m trying to tell you—”

“Coy! Me! Don’t you dare say that. I’ve never been coy in my life. I’m telling you now I won’t go away until I’ve found out what’s been going on at the Hilltop, that light in the window, the crying, the grey hair I found, why I slipped on the stairs, why they all want to persuade me I’m a sleep-walker.”

“If you’d only listen a minute,” said Dougal, raising his voice, “I’d tell you—”

“How
could
I go away? Me, supposed to write articles and running away from something that might really be a story! Why, I’ve practically made Simon admit he gives Bella the brandy, and Gussie knows something that I’ll get out of him before I’m a day older.”

“If you don’t go away,” said Dougal with sudden quiet distinctness, “you might not
be
a day older.”

“Why, there you are!” came a voice behind them. Antonia swung round to see Ralph Bealey standing smiling his flat smile and looking from her to Dougal with an expression that, for him, was probably pleasure. “I was just going to snatch a bite of lunch myself. May I join you?”

“Of course,” said Antonia in a far-off voice. (So he was shadowing her, as she had suspected.) Dougal said nothing.

Ralph Bealey pulled out a stool and sat down, he took out a cigarette as he waited for his order to be taken.

“Do you mind if I smoke?”

“Not at all,” said Antonia. Had Dougal suddenly lost his tongue? He might at least be civil even if he had the same unexplained feeling of panic as she had in Ralph Bealey’s presence.

“Did you have any patients, Doctor Bealey?” she asked politely.

“No, I’m not completely organised yet.”

“Tell me,” said Dougal suddenly in the kind of voice he probably used for cross-examination, “what made you decide to come to Christchurch to practise?”

“Now, that’s an involved question. Shall I say that chiefly I liked the prospects?”

“Ah, it wasn’t a personal reason.”

“If you mean, was any particular person involved, no. As it affects my future life, of course—well, I like the thought of making a home here.”

Dougal gave him his level frankly assessing look. He drained his glass of milk.

“Antonia, will you call and see me at my office tomorrow morning. There are one or two things I’d like to discuss.”

Antonia was surprised.

“Tomorrow’s the floral procession.”

“Before that starts. Say eleven o’clock.”

“All right. Do you have to go now?”

“Yes. I’m in court all afternoon, otherwise I’d ask you to see me later. I’m sorry I have to rush off.”

“Look out for that fox!” called Antonia. She spoke lightly, but she had to crush her impulse to run after him and beg him to take her with him. She was being purely childish, afraid of being left alone with Ralph Bealey in broad daylight.

“He’s a nice young man,” Ralph observed.

“Is he?” said Antonia with apparent indifference.

She was conscious of Ralph’s quick glance. Now he was being inquisitive. Close-set dark eyes gave him an appearance of suspicion and meanness. Perhaps she judged Ralph unfairly when she judged him by his eyes.

“Don’t you think so?”

“Oh, I don’t know. We usually fight.”

Why was Dougal suddenly getting into a panic about her? And what had he been going to say to her? Now she wouldn’t know until tomorrow morning, and that was a long way off.

Ralph said he was going to drive her home a different way. He went through the hillside suburb of Cashmere with its brilliant rock gardens, its houses perched one above the other like birds on a rail. In a short time they left the houses behind and came on to the bare sheep-cropped hillside. The road wound like a smooth grey scar between rocky outcrops and low round hills. In the afternoon sunlight the rocks had a hard glare, the everlasting tussocks a golden shine. Beneath them the Canterbury plains lay like a map, stretching in blue shadows to the mountains in the west.

In spite of the brilliant sunshine the wind was chilly. It had an infinitely lonely sound when, at the highest point of the road, Ralph stopped the car and opened the door for Antonia to get out.

“Come and look at the view,” he invited.

The wind whipped round her skirts as she followed him to a ledge of rocks that overhung a steep drop into the valley below. On this side of the hill the blue waters of the bay shone like a jewel and the hillsides were deeply green with native bush. It was odd, the bleak clear bony sun-dried slopes on one side, and the sparkling water and lush vegetation on this.