скачать книгу бесплатно
Then she moved her shoulders impatiently. She was becoming fanciful. Just because he had not shown an immediate interest in her, she was mentally endowing him with attributes he did not possess. Why should she care one way or the other?
Turning on her heel, she walked towards the stairs, intending to go in search of Julie, when the maid she had seen earlier reappeared.
“Oh, Miss Farrell. I've spoken to Cook and she says would you like breakfast serving in the morning room? The other members of the household, those who take breakfast, that is, usually eat in their rooms on Sunday mornings.”
“I see.” Ruth paused at the foot of the stairs. “Did you know Mr. Hardy is in the lounge?”
“No, miss.” The maid looked surprised. “Perhaps I'd better ask him, too.”
“Yes, you do that.” Ruth half smiled, leaning back against the banister.
The maid disappeared into the lounge and emerged a few moments later nodding her head. “Mr. Hardy does want breakfast, miss. Would that be for two?”
“Why not?”
Ruth was amused. If Julie came upon them now, she would imagine Ruth had engineered the whole thing.
The maid went to tell the cook of the arrangements and Ruth decided to wait in the morning room. Picking up one of the morning papers off the hall table, she opened a cream panelled door and entered a sun-filled dining room. This was the morning room where the family usually ate breakfast and lunch, and the table was already laid with a pristine white cloth.
Seating herself at the end nearest the windows, she scanned the headlines desultorily, unconsciously waiting for Patrick Hardy to join her. When he eventually appeared, she pretended not to notice him, assuming an intense interest in the article she was reading.
“May I join you?” he enquired, before seating himself opposite her, and she looked up in feigned surprise.
“Oh! Oh, yes, please do.” She nodded and returned to her newspaper, unaware that a slight smile touched the corners of his mouth as he sat down.
The maid returned to ascertain their individual requirements, but Ruth only wanted fruit juice and toast. Patrick Hardy, however, agreed upon porridge followed by ham and eggs, sausages and tomatoes. Ruth, to whom a fried breakfast was slightly abhorrent, sat in silence as he waded through the enormous meal, thinly buttering her toast and drinking several cups of coffee. She was amazed at his capacity, wondering how he could remain so lean and muscular when her father, who really ate very little, sported the thickening waistline of so many of his colleagues.
By the time he had reached the toast and marmalade stage, Ruth was finished, but she remained at the table studying the dregs of coffee left in the bottom of her cup.
“I can't say I care for Marion's choice of coffee,” he remarked unexpectedly, wiping his mouth on a table napkin. “That's one commodity which is not in short supply where I come from. And excellent it is, too.”
Ruth looked up. “There are coffee plantations in Venezuela?”
“Some, yes. But Brazil is virtually on our doorstep, and it's the largest producer of coffee in the world.”
“Yes.” Ruth nodded. “Have you been to Brazil?”
“Several times.” He drew a case of cheroots out of his pocket. “Do you mind? I'm afraid I can't offer you a cigaette.”
“I don't smoke,” replied Ruth, relaxing. “But I don't mind at all. I like the smell of good tobacco.”
He placed one of the long thin cigars between his teeth and lit it with a narrow gold lighter. Then he inhaled deeply, half turning in his seat to rest his elbow on the back of the chair. His eyes, Ruth saw now, were not brown as she had thought, but grey, and his lashes were long and thick. They were disturbingly intent eyes when they chose to be, and she rushed into speech, half afraid of their penetration.
“I suppose you've seen a lot of South America,” she suggested nervously.
“Quite a lot,” he agreed. “But there's still a lot I haven't seen and would like to. There have been so many civilisations – so many cultures. I find the whole history of the area absolutely fascinating.”
“But your work isn't concerned with history, is it?”
He smiled wryly. “Oh, no. My work is very much a contemporary thing. A product of the twentieth century in every sense of the word. But that doesn't stop me from spending every available moment delving into the past.”
“I'm afraid the only thing I remember learning about Venezuela was how it got its name,” confessed Ruth charmingly. “Didn't Christopher Columbus discover the Indians living in huts standing in water and decide it reminded him of Venice?”
Patrick dropped ash from the end of his cigar into the bronze ashtray in the centre of the table. “Well, you've got the facts there, but they're somewhat confused. Columbus did discover Venezuela as you've said, but it was another Spaniard, Alonso de Ojeda, who found Lake Maracaibo and the Indian huts standing in water. He called it Little Venice – Venezuela, as it is today. Did you know that the first Spanish settlement in the whole of South America was on an island off the coast of Venezuela called Cubagua?”
“Cubagua!” Ruth repeated the name slowly. “What a nice sound that has.”
Patrick shrugged. “It's principally a pearling centre now.”
“Do men actually dive for pearls?” she asked, her voice betraying her excitement.
“Well, it's not quite as simple as that,” he replied dryly.
“And where you work – what is it like there? Do you have tropical vegetation and rain forests?” Her eyes were wide.
He drew on his cheroot. “There are rain forests at the southern end of the lake,” he conceded tolerantly. “But they're not the romantic things you seem to imagine them to be. They stand in areas usually with a rainfall in excess of eighty inches with no apparent dry season, and humid temperatures up to ninety degrees.”
Ruth sighed, resting her chin on her knuckles. “But you live there,” she pointed out.
“Well, not actually in the rain forest,” he remarked, with a smile. “Part of the time I work in Maracaibo itself, which is Venezuela's second largest city, and they have skyscrapers and office blocks and the usual kind of traffic problems found the world over.”
“It sounds fascinating!” Ruth was enthralled. For all she had travelled all over the continent and visited the United States with her father, the places Patrick Hardy was talking about belonged to an entirely different kind of civilisation. She felt she could have gone on listening to his attractive voice all day.
Patrick studied her captivated face for several minutes after he had finished speaking, causing Ruth no small sense of consternation at the upheaval inside her he could so unknowingly provoke, and then he rose abruptly to his feet and leant across the table to press out the stub of his cheroot.
“You live in London, Miss Farrell?”
Ruth dropped her hands into her lap. “Yes, that's right.”
“And will you be leaving today?”
“After lunch, I expect. Julie and I are supposed to be going riding this morning. Do you ride, Mr. Hardy?”
“I have done,” he agreed, flexing his back muscles.
“Then why don't you join us?” she asked, pushing back her chair and standing up.
Although she was a tall girl, he was quite a bit taller than she was and consequently she had to look up to his face. He seemed to be considering what she had said quite seriously, and a ripple of anticipation slid down her spine.
“I don't somehow think Julie would second your suggestion,” he remarked at last, a slight smile lifting the corners of his mouth.
“Does that matter?” Ruth tipped her head on one side in a purely provocative gesture.
“I think it might,” he commented dryly, turning aside from her. “Tell me: has the winter been very hard so far? I was looking forward to snow-swept fields and frozen rivers. You've no idea how appealing such things can be in a tropical climate.”
Ruth clenched her fists. He had the unconscious knack of making her feel terribly youthful and inexperienced. She couldn't understand why. The men she knew, young and old alike, had all seemed to find her attention something to be desired, whereas Patrick Hardy treated her with complete indifference. Why? Had his years in Venezuela affected him to such an extent that he no longer required any form of feminine companionship? Julie had said he was devoted to his work. Was she right? Or was there some woman back in – where was it he said he worked? – Maracaibo? – waiting for him? Ruth realised she found that idea totally unacceptable …
Hooking her thumbs into the low belt of her trousers, she scuffed her heels impatiently and he turned back to her.
“What's wrong? Are you offended because I refused your invitation?”
Ruth's dark lashes lifted. “And if I was?”
He tugged absently at his ear. “Then I should apologise, of course.”
She still had the distinct impression he was mocking her, and it was infuriating. But before she had chance to reply the maid returned to clear the table. Turning to her, Ruth said: “Do you know if Miss Julie is up yet? We're going riding.”
The maid put her tray down on the table. “I took Miss Julie's breakfast in to her half an hour ago, miss, but she wasn't at all well. She said she had a terrible headache after the party last evening. I'm sure I don't know whether she'll be fit to go riding.”
Ruth sighed in exasperation, and without a backward glance she marched out of the morning room and took the stairs two at a time. At Julie's door she composed herself for a moment before tapping lightly on the panels, and at Julie's: “Come in!” she entered, closing the door behind her.
“Oh, hello, Ruth,” Julie exclaimed, putting a hand across her forehead. “I hoped you'd come. I feel awful!”
“Yes, so the maid just informed me. What's wrong? Didn't you sleep well?”
“Oh, yes, I slept all right. It's just this terrible migraine of mine. You know I get it from time to time. Well, I think all the noise last night must have started it off again.”
“I see.” Ruth thrust her hands into her trousers’ pockets. “So you won't be going riding.”
“I'm afraid not. I'm sorry, Ruth.”
“Don't be silly. It's not your fault. But it's a glorious morning. Frosty, of course, but the sun's breaking through.”
“Well, you go if you want to,” suggested Julie. “Ask Mike to join you. He could use my horse.”
“I doubt whether Mike is even awake yet,” replied Ruth dampeningly. “Don't concern yourself, Julie. I shan't go. I might even decide to drive back to town after all.”
“This morning?”
“Why not? There's not much else to do.”
“Oh, dear!” Julie propped herself up on her elbows. “Don't do that, Ruth. I've had my tablets and I'll probably be fine by lunchtime. Why don't you stay over until tomorrow? You've got no particular reason to get back to town, have you? You can always telephone your father.”
Ruth hesitated. “I don't know,” she began.
“Well, think about it,” appealed Julie. “Please. And don't go before lunch whatever you decide.”
“All right.” Ruth smiled at her friend's concerned face. “I won't.” She turned towards the door. “I'll go now and leave you to get some rest. We can talk later.”
“Marvellous!”
Julie sank back on her pillows looking pale and drawn, and Ruth let herself quietly out of the door.
As she descended the stairs again she saw Patrick Hardy standing in the hall. Slowing her step, she half wished she could have turned and gone back up again without him seeing her, but he had heard her. He came to the foot of the stairs and resting one hand on the banister, said: “How is Julie?”
Ruth halted two steps above him. “She has a migraine.”
“So she won't be going riding?”
“No.”
“Will you?”
“On my own? No, thanks.” Ruth was abrupt.
Patrick regarded her mutinous face tolerantly for a minute, and then he said quietly, but distinctly: “I didn't mean you to go alone. I'll come with you – if you still want me to.”
Ruth stared at him with the warm colour rising in her cheeks. “You don't have to do that.”
“I know I don't have to. Do you want to go, or don't you?”
Ruth took a deep breath. “I'd love to,” she answered simply.
“Good.” He moved away from the stairs. “Then I suggest you go and put on some more clothes. I'll wait for you in the lounge.”
“All right.”
Ruth nodded, and turning sped back up the stairs. The blood was pounding through her veins, and she was filled with a sense of expectancy out of all proportion to the occasion. It was the very last thing she had expected, but there had been no thought of refusal.
Zipping herself into a warm navy blue parka, she tried to school herself to calmness. What was she about to do, after all, but go riding with a cousin of Julie's father? That should be nothing to get so excited about, and she was courting trouble if she thought it was. It was simply that Patrick Hardy was a kind and polite man, taking pity on her because her friend wasn't well. He didn't really want to take her riding. The situation had practically been forced upon him.
Downstairs, she entered the lounge with a faint sense of trepidation to find Patrick standing by the windows, a warm sheepskin coat accentuating his dark masculinity. He turned at her entrance and said: “I've told Cook where we're going. Apparently no one else is up yet.”
Ruth made a gesture of acquiescence and then they both moved out into the hall. He had apparently informed the groom, too, that they intended going riding, because as they descended the steps at the front of the house, a stable boy appeared leading their two mounts.
It was exhilarating to have the wind tugging her hair, tangling it into wild disorder, as they went down the drive and across the road and into the meadow. A rime frost had cast a film of white over the grasses and they crunched with a curiously satisfying sound under the horses’ feet.
They didn't speak much to begin with. Patrick was obviously in no hurry, allowing his mount to pick its way as he took an encompassing look at the countryside. Ruth, on the other hand, was accustomed to these surroundings, and she gave the mare its head, galloping on with careless grace.
Eventually he caught up with her and their pace slowed to negotiate a belt of trees, coming out on to a grassy hillside overlooking a village in a valley, the sound of church bells ringing in the clear air.
“There's nowhere in the world where the sound of church bells on a Sunday morning sounds quite so charming,” remarked Patrick, reining in beside her, and taking out his case of cheroots. Cradling the lighter against the wind, he lit one of the narrow cigars and exhaled blue smoke with enjoyment. “We have churches in Puerto Roca, but their bells never sound like this.”
“Puerto Roca?” Ruth frowned. “That's where you live?”
Patrick nodded. “That's right.” He dismounted. “Shall we walk?”
They walked in companionable silence for a while, leading the horses, until Ruth said: “How long do you expect to stay in England, Mr. Hardy?”
Patrick shrugged. “Six or seven weeks. I'm not sure. Why?”
He was very direct and Ruth flushed. “I was interested, that's all. Perhaps you'd like to come and have dinner with my father and myself one evening when you're in London.”
“That's very kind of you.”
He was polite, but non-committal, and Ruth glanced at him a little impatiently. She could read nothing in his expression, however; he was an enigma, and that knowledge did not please her.
They were passing through some trees when Ruth tripped over a root, and in trying to save herself caught her hair on the bare, twig-like branches protruding from a thorn bush. She cried out in agony as her scalp was almost wrenched from her head, and with watering eyes endeavoured to free herself. But it was useless; her tangled hair clung to the bark, and it hurt more than ever when she tried to extricate it.
