Sons of the Wolf (20 page)

"Love. It is a big word, Harriet. Are you sure you know what it means?"

"No. That is, I have never-"

"Haven't you? I forget how young you are and how inexperienced. Harriet, there are so many kinds of love. The kind you are imagining doesn't exist, except in the minds of naive young girls. Ada fancies she is in love. Do I you think this love would survive a year of marriage to 11 man who has nothing in common with her, no breeding, I no knowledge of the world in which she has been brought up?"

His voice was low. It echoed oddly in my ears, as though he were speaking from far off. I sat with head bowed, looking at the long muscular hands that held mine; my heart was pounding so hard it seemed to shake the ruffles at my breast. When he stopped speaking, I muttered a "No" that was as meaningless and involuntary as words spoken in a dream.

"No. Of course not. Love between husband and wife is based upon communality of class and background. It develops after marriage. Ada is incapable of a genuine passion, Harriet. She is not like you."

Heaven help me, I think I was half mesmerized by the voice and the hands. They still held my hands; now I was aware of a pull, gentle but persistent, that drew me toward him. I was as limp as a stupid stuffed doll, I could feel myself swaying toward him, held erect only by his hands and by a terrifying, vital current that ran through my veins like fire. The voice went on, murmuring and musical, lulling me farther into the spell. . . . And then one phrase caught my failing senses and brought me back to awareness.

". . . after she has been with him for a night or two ..."

It struck my brain like a dash of icy water. The world fell back into place around me, the dreamy, languorous spell of his voice was broken. I seemed to return from some distant place to find myself bolt upright in my chair, my hands straining to free themselves.

"With him?" My voice was almost a shriek. "Where? With whom?"

"Certainly not with the groom," said Mr. Wolfson, eyeing me keenly.

"With your son. Francis . . . My God, are you mad to do such a thing?"

"Language, language, my dear."

"I wish I knew words enough to tell you how vile you are. Dear heaven, this will kill her! She is only a child, she doesn't know-"

"She thought she knew-enough to yearn for the arms of the stable boy. My son's embraces are surely preferable to that. Damn you, Harriet, will you stop struggling? You will only hurt yourself. I'm not planning to ruin the wench, after all. A few days-and nights-with my obedient offspring, and she will be happy to settle for a respectable marriage. They will make a charming couple, don't you think? And the great gossiping world need never know that they anticipated their wedding night by a few days."

He meant it. Sincerity breathed in every line of his face-sincerity and genuine impatience with my blindness. If he had looked and acted the villain, if he had shown any awareness of evildoing, I might have been able to control myself and fight cunning with cunning. As it was, I lost my wits completely. I think I was crying-there were tearstains on my face later-but I was unaware of that or anything else, even the pain in my wrists, as I struggled against the iron fingers that held them like fetters. I felt myself being pulled out of my chair. My knees struck the floor with a jolt that left bruises, even through the thickness of skirts and petticoats; I was kneeling at his feet, held motionless by a grip that had shifted from my wrists to my arms and pinned them across his knees. He lifted one hand and deliberately slapped me twice across the face.

"Good," he said calmly, as my incoherent voice stopped in the middle of a shout. "A sovereign remedy for hysterics, that one. I had thought better of you, Harriet. But I must confess I find your spirit more attractive than Ada's whining. Are you calm now, or shall we try another dose of the same?"

I shook my hair out of my eyes; it had completely escaped its pins and net and was falling in heavy masses over my shoulders.

"Let me up!"

"No, no, not yet. I'm afraid you might do me some harm."

"If I could . . ."

"You would, of course. Haven't you forgotten my little pets, Harriet?"

"Yes. No. I don't care about them."

He laughed-a queer, choked sound quite unlike his usual chuckle. I have never heard such a sound before; I pray I never will again, for I know, now, what it means. Even then I realized that something new and dangerous had entered the quiet room. I blinked frantically to clear my vision and looked up at his face.

Then I saw it-the face of the wolf. His lips were drawn back in a travesty of a smile, and the long white teeth seemed, impossibly, to have grown longer and sharper. There was no color in his blazing eyes. The old wives' tales had been correct when they whispered of him as a beast. But their poor imaginations had turned into a harmless fairy tale this reality which was worse, because it was true. I made no effort to resist when those abnormally developed arms and shoulders lifted me like a child, off the floor and into his embrace.

It was physically painful, but I hardly felt the force of the arms that held me or the rocklike muscle of his shoulder against the back of my head. Had he but known it, there was no need for duress; if he had taken his hands away, I would still have lain there across his knees, staring up into his face like a mesmerized madwoman. I saw the contours of his face quiver, as if in some internal struggle. I tried to close my eyes to shut out his distorted features, but they would not close, not even when the face came nearer and nearer, till at last it filled the whole of my vision.

I wonder how long it will be before I can remember that embrace without feeling it again, in every nerve of my body. . . .

But the worst . . .

I will write it! I must face the truth in order to fight it. The worst was that, though part of me cried out in dumb but violent protest against his embrace-another part did not. It was the conflict within myself that shook me most, disgust and repugnance warring with my own baser instincts. . . .

I must get away from here. Not only for Ada's sake, but for my own. No one can protect me from him; he can do whatever he wishes. And I know what he wants. When his lips left mine, leaving me gasping and limp, he made his intentions clear.

"Harriet," he said thickly. Then in a more normal voice: "Always you surprise me, my dear. Is it your Italian blood, perhaps? If I didn't know your grandmother so well, I could fancy that this was not your first experience. . . . What a pity you aren't the heiress, sweetheart; we could solve my problem without all this fuss. And I wouldn't let one of my feeble sons deputize for me, you may be sure of that."

Again he bent his head. I turned my face so that his lips only touched my cheek. His embrace had loosened; he held me with one arm while his free hand stroked my hair and face and throat. Perhaps it was the insulting sureness of his touch that roused me. I would prefer to think it was some lingering remnant of decency. I moved so quickly that his hands missed their grasp, and then I stood facing him from several feet away.

"You flatter yourself," I said, trying to keep my voice level. "I won't have you or one of your sons. Nor will Ada. You think me helpless. . . . But there are laws it this country for the protection of the helpless."

"Certainly," he said blandly. "All you need to do is find someone who can apply them. There may be a magistrate in Ripon, but probably York is the better place."

"Then I will go to York."

"On foot? Without money?" He laughed. "Why fight your own nature, Harriet? Do you take me for a fool? Do you think I have no experience of women, that I can't tell that you-"

"Stop it!" I retreated as he came out from behind the desk, his hands on the wheels of the chair. The movement gave me more courage; he could not pursue me that way, and his vanity would keep him from trying to walk.

"Wait a moment," I said. "Why must Ada marry Francis? Why can't we be reasonable? You don't need her money-"

"Ah, but I do. All this"-he waved a comprehensive hand around the richly furnished room-"all this is facade, my dear. My fortune is gone; my wife's dowry is spent-in fact, the funds of a certain young gentleman, for whom I have been acting as trustee, have also melted away. Since the estimable youth reaches his majority in a few months, it is not even a question of luxury or poverty for me, but one of prison or freedom. Do you think"-the words were a snarl-"that I'll let the whims of a silly girl stand between me and security? I must have Ada's money. When she marries-my son, it will be under my control."

The words were like a sharp knife severing the one strand of rope that had held me from falling into an abyss. His villainy was not the abstract, storybook affair it had seemed; it had a concrete, practical motive. There was no possible hope of his relenting.

At that moment I did not think of that or of plans of escape; I only knew that I must get away from him, away from the chill gleaming eyes and merciless hands, away from the invisible cord of unwilling sympathy that drew me to something I hated. With one sudden powerful movement of his arms he sent the chair rolling toward me, and I turned and fled, slamming the door behind me, holding my skirts high as I pounded along the corridor and up the stairs. I did not stop until I was in my own room with the door locked, and for a long time I crouched on the floor with my ear to the panel, waiting for sounds of pursuit.

It did not come. Of course he would not follow me. Why should he trouble himself? All he needed to do was wait, and no doubt his monstrous vanity convinced him that he would not wait long.

When at last I got unsteadily to my feet, I felt as if I had just arisen from a long illness. The lightening skies outside my window shocked my sight; it seemed incredible that my whole world had been overturned in such a short space of time, or that the sun could shine on such black villainy. The light drew me; I went to the window and sat down, staring out at the courtyard below.

The normalcy of the scene was a second shock. The horses were being exercised; old Adam had just come out of a stall with one of the grays that drew Mr. Wolfson's carriage. I thought of David and could have beaten my fists against the windowpane in frustrated fury. I had thought him not good enough for Ada!

Mr. Wolfson had said that David might try to communicate with Ada. Yes, but that was part of his lie, to convince me and keep me stupid and quiet a little longer. Perhaps the boy did try to reach Ada, but he cannot have succeeded. He would need a confederate among the servants, and I know only too well how much they fear their employer. I knew, also, that they could not help me. I would only betray myself if word of any such appeal reached Wolfson. He must think me cowed and frightened.

He would have me imprisoned too if he thought me capable of defying him.

In a sudden panic I flew to the door. Perhaps he had already locked me in! But, no-the key was on the inside. I withdrew the key-somehow I felt more secure with it in my hand-and went back to my seat at the window.

As I watched, William came out of the manor door into the courtyard. He went to Adam and stood talking, giving him directions of some sort, for the old man's head kept nodding. William. How much did he know of the secret affairs of Mr. Wolfson? He was his master's right-hand man, and yet I suspected that William was too clever to be mixed up in such a business. No, Mr. Wolfson would keep him unwitting if he could. Might I then appeal to William for help?

I looked at the man's stiff back and emotionless face and decided-no. William might believe me, but he would never admit it. Belief would involve him just as thoroughly as complicity, and he was not the man to be involved in what he would call "unpleasantness." And there was always the chance that he was Mr. Wolfson's tool, in which case an appeal would only betray me.

I could trust no one. It was an unpleasant truth, but one I had to face.

The knowledge should have cast me into utter despair. For some strange reason it had precisely the opposite effect. If I could trust no one, I must rely on myself.

So I turned to this diary, and, as I hoped, it has helped me settle my mind. I must get away from the manor. That is the first, the immediate step to be taken.

The first thing I will do after that is look for Ada. I think I know where she may be. There are not many places, near or far, where a girl may be kept an unwilling and protesting prisoner. Places where screams and cries for help cannot be heard . . .

I saw her yesterday morning. She has only been gone for one day-and night. But that is enough.

I must find her! Surely he cannot be with her every moment; there must be a chance to let her free. In my present mood I could even face him-Francis-big as he is, and fly at him with any weapon that came to hand, a rock, a stick!

But... if I cannot find her quickly, or if I cannot free her, then I must go on without her and get help. I, or we, will try to reach Middleham. If David is there-he has an aunt living in the village-he will take care of Ada. How gladly, now, would I entrust her to his hands!

For I see now the meanings of so many little incidents that I ignored or misinterpreted. The gypsies were not David's tools; they were Wolfson's. Dear heaven, he flung it in my face time and again, their dependence on him! David must have overheard some allusion to the plot while he was visiting the gypsy camp-and I wonder, now, whether his reconciliation with his kin might not have been prompted by suspicion. If so, he was not alone in his mistrust of Wolfson. To think that the whole countryside walked in darkest fear of him while I sat and simpered under his flattery! The landlord in Middleham and his timid daughter; old Dodds, shrinking even from the coin that had touched Wolfs hand . . . they were afraid, all of them-and rightly. Heaven knows what oppression and cruelty he has visited upon them.