They Met in Zanzibar (17 page)

“Quite a lot, so long as your health and spirits began to improve. And I’d see to it that they did.” His voice did take on a faint urgency as he went on, “Getting you well and happy means a great deal to me. I’m not a boy with impossible ideals. I’m a man who’s been around and knows what he wants. And you’re a girl who thought she was in love in England but found out she wasn’t when something a little fiercer came into her life. You wouldn’t have had that so-called crush on me if you’d still been in love with Paul! But I don’t intend to harp on the love theme. Just now, that’s not important. What is important is your attitude to life. It was such a gay and excitable one - and it will be again. Come and
l
ive in my house with me, Peg. We’ll go slowly at first, and then start having quiet fun. And don’t worry about me and what I shall get out of it. I’ll be a million times happier with you there, depending on me, than if I had to keep coming over to the hotel to see how you were making out; because I know you’d never set
tl
e contentedly, even
for
a short while, into that sort of life. You’d feel wretched and so would I.”

Faint agitation showed in the way she withdrew her hand from his clasp. “I can’t answer you now, Steve. I have to think about it.”

“There’s not much to think over. You were half in love with me once; if Paul Lexfield hadn’t lurked in the background you’d probably have gone the whole way.”

“But you were never in love with me.”

“I do love you,” he said, in carefully flat accents. “But I don’t think it’s wise or necessary to dissect how we feel about each other. I want the blessed relief of having you in my house and in my care. You need me, and in a way you wouldn’t understand I need you. So what are we arguing about?”

She gathered her bag from a chair nearby. “I can’t give you an answer yet. Please take me back to my rooms.” They walked from the club to the side entrance of the clinic which gave on to a
zigzag
flight of steps. Peg wouldn’t have said anything more except a quick good-bye, but Steve took her arm, detaining her.

“I'm seeing about a licence this afternoon,” he said. “I’ll pick you up for dinner tonight. We’ll go out to my place.”

“Steve ... no,” she said hurriedly. “I don’t want to go there till
... unless...”

“All right, don’t panic. I’ll call here to see you after
dinner
- about nine.” He smiled. “Worrying is a good sign, but don’t do it on my account. We’re getting married, Peg.”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Please let me go now.”

He did. Peg walked up the stairs; running up them still made her head throb a little and it was an uncanny sensation she wanted to avoid till the chances of its recurrence were well in the past. Her head was already slightly muzzy.

She entered the bare, clinical bed-sitting room, with its bed and divan, its bowl of flowers, its couple of chairs and tables, its expanse of gleaming floor and the single rug beside the bed. Distaste for it seemed to well up into her throat, and she walked into the dressing room, got out of her dress and cleaned from her face the make-up she had so carefully applied this morning, for Paul. Wearing only the cool underwear, she lay down and closed her eyes. She felt played out and a wee bit sick. Thinking was so difficult and feeling things was frightening.

Marry Steve, live in his house, be his companion, have him there always to depend upon ... was it possible? He didn’t need a housekeeper, but he had said he needed Peg. How could he need her? What could she give, gaunt ghost that she was now? Did he feel responsible because he had been her father’s friend and had gone against him over the sale of the plantations? I
f s
o, there was no reason for that; Jim had said he understood, that the younger men had acted rightly.

She remembered things she had thought were locked away for ever. Her father’s bouts of misplaced energy, the water-skiing, his broodiness, his sudden anxiety to have his accounts straight. He hadn’t consulted the doctor, but he must have known he was overtaxing his heart. He must have known, because he had arranged that Steve act as his executor. Poor Jim Maldon; if only she
could weep for him.

She was deathly tired... and deathly afraid of loneliness. But marriage...

Peg dozed, and awoke unrefreshed. The morning seemed far away and unreality overlaid that talk with Steve. It was as though she had dreamed that he had said he wanted her; dreamed it because subconsciously she had a tremendous need of him.

She took a bath and put on a white linen dress that made her look too thin; but she hadn’t the energy to change it. She ate a little of the supper brought by the orderly, and suddenly knew that she loathed the fluffy white concoction made from dehydrated potato flakes, the half-cooked eggs, the unvarying fingers of thin toast, the small bowl of chopped fruits. How had she stood it so long?

Peg drank the weak coffee black and lit a cigarette. Groping and desperate, she walked on to the balcony and watched the dark waterfront, the tall palms, the shimmering, star-shot sea. She heard the slam of a car door and looked over the balcony wall. There he was. Steve strong and dependable, vital ... and willing to take care of her. He accepted that she had nothing to give, and would make no demands. She knew the answer she would give him in a minute’s time, when he came into the room. There could be only one.

CHAPTER SEVEN

When P
eg awoke on Wednesday morning she didn’t at once realise it was her wedding day. For quite five
min
utes she hardly thought at all, but lay looking up at the familiar whiteness of the ceiling and listening to the early noises outside. This side of the clinic was a long way from the outpatients’ entrance, but because the air was clear and traffic non-existent, it was possible, by straining, to hear the muted chatter of the people gathering to have wounds dressed and coughs doctored.

It was when Peg turned her head and saw the open trunk on the floor that she remembered. She sat up quickly and swung her legs out of bed. This was her last morning in the suite! Her last morning as Peg Maldon. Margaret Cor
tl
and, she said to herself; it sounded like someone else.

She went to the mirror, saw a thin, pale gold face without any pink in it, a tousle of corn-silk hair which still parted itself at the scar on her head, and a mouth that was tremulously trying to smile. Could Steve possibly want this wraith of Peg Maldon as his wife? He’d said so a good many times in different ways since the weekend, and because she’d wanted to believe him she had not questioned the statement. And she daren’t question it now. She needed Steve as she had never needed anyone before, and some time, perhaps, she would be able to tell him all it meant to her to have him take over her life just at this moment, when she was physically well but still suffering from a mental numbness.

She had her breakfast, took a bath and put on a robe, and when she came back into the room Netta Fellowes
was there, filling the Etruscan vase with water from a jug. On the table lay a pretty bouquet of Malayan roses, deep pink, with trails of tiny white vine bells.

Netta wasn’t arch or jolly. She was deeply, quietly happy that Peg should be going to marry a man who would take tremendous care of her.

“
Well
,
this is the wonderful day,” she said, as she lodged the bouquet in water. “Do you like the flowers?
I had them picked at dawn, and by eleven they’ll have opened a little more. I’m so glad you decided to wear white.”

“
You
decided,” said Peg with a smile. “If it hadn’t been for you I’d have had to wear something oldish and coloured. I still don’t know how you got that woman to work so fast.”

“These islanders will do anything for a wedding. I’ll tell you something - I designed the little white cap myself, and I’ve even been able to borrow a sprig of orange blossom for it. So with a tiny pale blue ribbon on the bouquet you’ll be the traditional bride, even if you don’t wear a veil.”

Peg looked at the plain, cheerful little face. “I couldn’t have got through these weeks without you, Netta. It’s funny, I hardly knew you before, but now you’ve become someone important in my life, and very dear. You’ll come over and see us soon, won’t you?”

“Yes, of course.” She gave another twist to the vines. “It’s a pity you and Steve can’t have a honeymoon, but that’s how things work out sometimes. He’ll probably take you away during the rains. Is there anything I can do for you now?”

“No, thank you, Netta. You and Dick are picking me up at a quarter to eleven, aren’t you?”

“I’ll come up a little before that and leave Dick outside. I’m going over to arrange a few flowers in the register office now. I think even a civil wedding can be pretty.”

She went from the room, and Peg, gazing pensively at the lovely little bouquet, wondered if calmness
was
such a good sign. Brides were always tremulous, but she wasn’t; it was if there were a thick soundproof curtain between herself and everyone else - yes, even between herself and Steve. She could remember how she had felt about him a couple of months ago; palpitant, bewildered, tortured. But they now seemed to be emotions that had happened to someone else, though she knew they hadn’t. If Steve could rip her apart then, surely it meant that she would still be in love with him now, if tragedy hadn’t intervened? And it followed that when she was really fit again she would love him even more ardently than before. That was what she wanted and would work towards - to love him and repay him for all he had done for her and would do for her as soon as she became his wife.

Perhaps the reason for her calmness was very simple; she
wanted
to belong to Steve.

At ten o’clock she began to dress. Her best white lingerie, colourless tights which made her long slim legs look a matt shade of honey, high heeled white shoes. She slipped on the dress and zipped it, straightened the swathed sash and moved her shou
l
ders to make the swee
tl
y curved neckline sit perfec
tl
y. It was soft white organdie but not very stiff; the sleeves were full to just below the elbow, where they fitted into a curved band, and the skirt belled delightfully over a petticoat of the same material. It was the only white material to be had at short notice, but the little cap, a twist of the same material over a piece of shaped buckram, would turn it into a wedding dress.

Peg brought a face towel for shielding her shoulders to the dressing table, but de
cid
ed not to make up her face yet. It was warming up outdoors, and she wanted to look cool and unhurried when she met Steve. She lit another cigarette and paced about the room. A porter came for the trunk, and an orderly brought iced coffee and a couple of yellow tablets in a tiny cellophane wrapper.

“The tuan-doctor says you must swallow these after the coffee, please,” the boy said, smiling whitely. “The mem leaves us to be married?”

“Yes. Will you miss me?”

“Will miss memtuan, but marriage is good.”

He went out and Peg got through the coffee and swallowed the tablets. Time to make up now. She must find some pins to keep the towel about her shoulders. She opened a drawer, heard a sound quite close behind her and looked up, into the mirror. Her fingers ceased moving and very slowly, she straightened and turned to face Lynette Foster.

A Lynette Foster whose face was rigid with control. She wore a
thin
houndstooth suit in brown and beige, a small brown hat and brown shoes. Beige gloves were rolled tightly between her hands; scarlet thumbnails and white knuckles were startling contrasts.

“Well, well - the bride,” she said in a choked, breathy voice. “Michael told me you were changed, and he was right. So that’s how you got Steve ... with the ethereal, pitiful look. You’ve certainly made the most of a spot of concussion!”

Had Peg been anything like her normal self she would have known what to say; something flippant, something disarming, perhaps. But at that moment she was quite stunned. She heard herself saying, “I thought you’d left Motu. I haven’t seen Michael lately, and I thought
...”

“You thought of nothing ... except yourself, and getting Steve. But I
am
leaving, right now. I’m actually on my way to the airstrip in Michael’s car.” Her nostrils went thin and pale. “I told him I wanted to say goodbye to you, and he said I mustn’t be long because he has to get back for your wedding.
Your wedding
!”
She laughed discordantly. “It’s really funny, this wedding. You’re not in love with Steve. From what I hear, you’re not capable of being in love with anyone. And he’s using you - do you know that?”

A pain began to stab at Peg’s throat. “I
think
you’d better go. I’m terribly sorry I haven’t been in touch with you, but I thought you’d left long ago. Then I saw you from the window ... but I’m afraid I forgot it again. My memory’s been a
little
... unreliable lately. You could have come to see me, Lynette.”

“Drool over you, as others have done, including my idiot brother? Can you imagine me doing that? You haven’t done badly out of that accident to your father, have you? Instead of kicking around at trying to make his plantation pay you’ve been able to sell out at a good figure. Your father being the type he was, I daresay you had a good number of debts to settle, but you do have private money, and now you’re going to marry a man who has plenty, too. You’re set for life - and all because your father died suddenly and yo
u
got a bang on the head.” She almost hurled the next words: “You’ve certainly handled things cleverly - I’ll grant you that. Once you were flat on your back in a darkened room with a pretty bandage round your head, I might as well have said goodbye and gone my way to Europe. I stayed because I knew that Steve has been more in love with me than with any other woman he’s ever known. It isn’t love he has for you; it’s pity, and a sense of responsibility because you’re the daughter of his old buddy. That’s all!”

Peg drew a quivering breath. “After that, you may as well go, don’t you think? I’m sorry you feel bitter, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Lynette’s white teeth went together, audibly. “You’d better be careful with your sympathy, or I may spoil the look of that dress for you. I won’t be patronised by a drooping little cheat who couldn’t have made headway at all without becoming an object of pity.”

“You’ve ... really said enough,” said Peg unsteadily. “It was most unkind to come here now, like this.”

“Unkind!” Lynette laughed again, loudly. “That’s not the way I feel towards you, my pet. I think you ought to know the whole truth. Everything was going fine between Steve and me till you rammed the tree with your car. Even afterwards, things went so well that I put off leaving. Then, somehow, you became important. You weren’t responding to treatment; you had nervous shock because you were actually beside your father when he
died...”

“Stop it!”

“That shakes you, doesn’t it?” Lynette said, with bitter glee. “Well, there’s more to come. In his new job Steve is expected to marry; he likes it so well that he’s willing to pay the price. He knows I love him, but he also knows that if he married me I’d never let him travel alone; if he wanted affairs he’d have to have them with me!”

Peg put a hand behind her, to steady herself. A terrible sickness was rising into her throat, and the sweat of weakness coursed down her spine. “Will you
please
go,” she whispered. “I can’t stand any more.”