Moonflower Madness (32 page)

She strolled through Green Park, her blouse of Alencon lace high at her throat, her lavender
crêpe-de-Chine
skirt skimming the ground. Charles'mother had been exquisitely kind to her, inviting her to every family occasion and outing. She had been grateful for the friendship and the affection. After visiting Plaxtol relations, Serena and Henry had departed for a delayed long honeymoon in Switzerland. If it hadn't been for Charles's family, she would have been virtually friendless.

When Charles had told his mother quite bluntly what the situation was between Gianetta and Zachary, his mother had immediately invited her to stay. Charles had his own, separate establishment, and it was not an arrangement that would cause embarrassment. It had been an offer that Gianetta had unhesitatingly accepted. The thought of living in Zachary's home, when he did not truly want her there, had been abhorrent to her. Charles' mother's kind invitation meant that she had a temporary home while she decided her future.

The first thing she had done was to ask Charles not to deliver Zachary's letter to his solicitor.

‘When Zachary returns, he can give his solicitor whatever instructions he pleases,' she had said to Charles, her face very pale. ‘But I would prefer those instructions to be given later rather than sooner.'

‘Zac won't change his mind,' Charles had said to her gently, knowing full well what she was hoping. ‘He never does.'

She hadn't replied. The hope she still clung to was so tenuous that it could only exist in silence. To put it into words would be to realize how foolish she was being, how totally unrealistic.

The second thing she had done on her return to London was to apply for a place at Lady Margaret Hall. The third had been to write to her grandparents in Italy.

Replies to both letters had far exceeded her expectations. She could go up to Lady Margaret Hall next year, and for the first time since her mother had died, her grandparents entered into correspondence with her.

They invited her to visit them in October, when they returned from a long-planned trip to Greece, and they approved of her decision to study at Oxford. Suddenly the world had seemed a brighter, sunnier place. She had a family again, a future to look forward to. All that she needed to make her happiness complete was a reconciliation with Zachary.

She bought herself a giant map of China and every evening she spread it out on her bed, tracing the route of the Kialing from Chung King to Peng and beyond, wondering where he was, wondering if he had found a blue Moonflower.

All through the autumn she followed what she imagined would be his route along the Wei-Hor into Kansu's heart. In the winter she thought of him holed up in a Chinese inn in Lanchow, Kansu's capital, waiting for the weather to break in order that he could begin his return journey. In the spring she waited for him to arrive in London, her nerves stretched almost to breaking point.

When he did arrive, she did not know for several days. It was Charles who told her.

‘He must have been here for quite some time,' he said awkwardly, a copy of
The Times
in his hand. ‘He's giving a public lecture at the Royal Geographical Society on Thursday evening.'

Their eyes held. His pitying, hers anguished. He hadn't been in touch with either of them, and he quite obviously didn't intend to be.

‘I think it's time I delivered his letter to his solicitor,' Charles said unhappily. ‘He'll know by now, of course, that I haven't done so, but it will show him that you accept the situation. That you're not going to fight him.'

‘Yes,' she said thickly. ‘Of course. If that is what you think is best. Thank you, Charles.'

She felt as bereft, as heartsick, as she had done on the long riverboat journey down the Kialing to Chung King. Since then hope had, little by little, returned. She had imagined him returning to his Chelsea house, expecting to find her in residence. She had imagined his consternation when he did not do so and of how he would then seek out Charles and of how Charles would tell him that she was staying with his mother. She had imagined their meeting in the drawing-room of the Rendlesham town house; of how she would tell him the annulment had not been put in hand because she didn't wish their marriage to be ended; that she didn't want to marry Charles; that she wanted to stay married to him. And she had imagined him being almost pole-axed with relief, had imagined him taking her in his arms, kissing her as he had done in the moonlit pagoda.

Now she saw her imaginings for what they were, foolish daydreams without a hint of substance. That she had not been at his Chelsea home had not concerned him in the slightest. He had made no enquiries as to her whereabouts. He hadn't cared.

She knew that the time had now come for her to face reality. And she would do so. But first she would see him for the last time and she would say goodbye to him in her own way, silently and from the rear of the Royal Geographical Society's public lecture hall.

‘What the devil do you think you are playing at?'
Charles demanded of Zachary furiously.

The last time they had faced each other it had been Zachary who had been hardly able to contain his inner hurt and jealous anger. Now it was Charles who was almost beside himself with frustration.

‘Why the devil didn't you get in touch when you arrived? How long have you been here? What are you trying to achieve by behaving like this?'

In the bland anonymity of his hotel suite Zachary continued dressing for his lecture.

‘I'm behaving in a way I think is best for all of us,' he replied tersely, fastening a starched collar onto his collar-button with some difficulty. ‘If you and Gianetta are impatient to be married, it's an impatience that will just have to be curbed.'

His hard-boned face was as devoid of expression as his eyes. ‘I'd thought things would have been more or less sorted out by now,' he continued with apparent indifference. ‘As they obviously are not, I shall see my solicitor in the morning and I'll ask him to expedite matters as quickly as possible.'

Charles tossed an envelope dismissively down onto the nearest flat surface. ‘It's the letter you gave me to hand to your solicitors,' he said abruptly. ‘At Gianetta's request I didn't do so. Considering your present behaviour I told her I thought holding off any longer was pointless and that it should be delivered. I was going to do it myself, as you asked, but it seems rather needless when you can now do it for yourself.'

Zachary finished fastening his shirt-collar and stared at him. With a surge of satisfaction Charles saw that he had managed to shock him.

‘You mean nothing has been put in hand with regard to an annulment or a divorce?' he asked, suddenly very still. ‘You and Gianetta aren't on the verge of getting married?'

‘No.' He wondered if Zac's trek had been a success. Whether it had or not, it had obviously been far more exhausting than any of his previous expeditions. There were deep lines carved around his mouth, and his near-black eyes had a haggard look he had never seen before.

As Zac continued to stare at him uncomprehendingly he said impatiently, ‘For the Lord's sake, Zac. When will you believe that Gianetta doesn't love me, has no desire to marry me and never has had?'

He walked away from Zachary and over to the high windows looking down over Albermarle Street. ‘I know I told you she had fallen in love with me at first sight, but it was just wishful thinking. Serena had mistakenly thought it to be the truth and when she told me, I so wanted it to be true that I believed her.'

‘Why did you lie to me?'

His voice was so taut that Charles wondered again if the expedition had been a success or if Zac had been ill.

‘I lied to you because of the kiss I forced from Gianetta,' he said unwillingly, staring down into the busy street.

All his anger had now deserted him. He felt ashamed of the boastful lie, ashamed of the incident that had given rise to it, and he hated the coolness and barely veiled hostility that now existed between himself and Zac.

‘I knew you thought badly of me for kissing her against her will when she was in such a vulnerable situation and when I should, instead, have been offering her my protection. I wanted you to think you had misjudged things and that I had been given encouragement.'

‘You
stole
the kiss from her? It wasn't freely given?'

There was something so odd in Zachary's voice that Charles turned round to face him.

‘Yes, I stole the kiss and no, it wasn't freely given,' he said, bewildered. ‘You knew that at the time. I've never known you be so angry …'

‘And Gianetta doesn't want to marry you? She isn't impatient for an annulment?'

‘No. She's only living with my mother because she felt you didn't truly want her living in your home and …'

Zachary grabbed hold of a bow-tie. ‘You mean she isn't at Chelsea?' he demanded, throwing the tie around his neck. ‘She's never been at Chelsea?'

Charles's bewilderment turned to stupefaction. ‘For the Lord's sake Zac! Didn't you know? Haven't you been home?'

Zachary shook his head and snatched hold of his jacket. ‘No, I just assumed …'

There was a knock on the door and a young boy's voice called out, ‘Your Hackney is waiting to take you to the Royal Geographical Society, Mr Cartwright.'

‘I'll be down presently.'

Zachary struggled into his jacket. Everything he had assumed had been wrong. He had caused himself months of unnecessary loneliness and tortured misery. Worse, he had inflicted the same loneliness and tortured misery on Gianetta.

Cursing himself for being the biggest fool of all time, joy roaring through him as he thought of the future that awaited him, he snatched up his lecture notes.

‘Come on, Charles!' he exhorted, striding for the door. ‘The sooner I get this bloody lecture over, the sooner I can be reunited with Gianetta!'

It was a mild evening and the lecture hall was full. Gianetta squeezed onto a row at the very back. On one side of her was an elderly, eminent-looking gentleman with a profusion of white side-whiskers. On the other side of her was a studious-looking young man wearing a pince-nez.

She clasped her hands tightly together on her lap. On the wall behind the empty speakers'platform was pinned a large map of China. She wondered if any of the august audience were as familiar with it as she was.

A whisper of anticipation rippled around the crowded room as a distinguished looking gentleman entered and took his place on the lecture platform. And then Zachary entered.

The sheer force of his personality brought a sense of excitement and danger into the room. He strode onto the lecture platform with almost insolent assurance, his shoulders seeming broader than ever beneath his closely-fitting evening jacket, his blue-black hair curling as indecently low in the nape of his neck as ever.

There was fierce welcoming applause, but Gianetta was unable to join in. Even at such a distance, his masculinity came at her in waves and she felt sick with longing for him.

The gentleman who was chairing the evening was now introducing him. She caught the words ‘privileged', ‘distinguished' ‘Kansu'and ‘Blue Moonflower', but the blood was pounding in her ears to such an extent that she could not string the words together. She was aware of nothing save that it was the last time she would ever see him; the last time she would hear his voice.

As he stepped forward to begin his lecture and as the applause eventually subsided, his eyes scanned the hall. She looked downwards swiftly, terrified that he would see her and that she would have to endure the added torment of his open indifference.

Only when he began to speak did she again raise her eyes. Any rag of hope that he had missed her as she had missed him, vanished once and for all. His eyes blazed with happiness so deep, his sun-bronzed face was transfigured by it. Obviously he had found the blue Moonflower; obviously, where she was concerned, he had not one regretful thought.

‘In discovering the blue Moonflower and bringing the seed back to Great Britain, I have taken upon myself the customary privilege of naming it,' he said to his attentively listening audience.

It was then that his brandy-coloured eyes swivelled to hers; then that she knew he had seen her even before he had begun to speak.

‘It is to be called
Ipomota Alba Gianettii
, after Gianetta, my wife.'

She couldn't breathe. The blood was roaring in her ears. Her heart was slamming so painfully that she thought it was going to explode.

His eyes burned hers. ‘My wife accompanied me on the first part of my expedition to Kansu but, due to deeply regrettable circumstances, was not able to continue with me into Kansu itself.'

Suddenly he was no longer speaking to the room at large, instead he was speaking only to her. ‘Will you join me on the platform, Gianetta?' he asked, his voice throbbing with emotion. ‘I need you by my side, now and for always.'

It was as if they were the only two people in the room; as if no-one else existed. With eyes shining with joy she rose to her feet. There was a burst of applause as she began to squeeze along the row towards the aisle. Dimly she was aware of Charles looking towards her, smiling broadly, and of Serena and Henry in the row in front of him.

On the platform Zachary was waiting for her and as she walked toward him the audience, sensing that far more was going on than met the eye, applauded louder than ever.

His hands reached out for hers.

‘Will you forgive me?' he asked huskily as their fingers entwined and she stepped up onto the platform beside him.

‘Yes,' she said lovingly as he drew her close, wondering how he could ever have doubted it.

Relief, so palpable that she could feel it, jarred through him.

‘I love you,' he said fiercely, ‘I shall always love you,' and then still holding her by the hand, he turned once more to his audience.