The Glittering Lights (Bantam Series No. 12) (16 page)

“Thank you for helping me to dress,” she said and walked downstairs.

She felt a little nervous as a footman opened the door of the Drawing-Room.

It was a very attractive room lit by a great Chandelier in the centre while candles in huge carved Italian candlesticks illuminated the rest of the room.

Lord Carwen had already said before dinner that he thought gaslight was ugly and that women looked their best by candlelight.

He was standing in front of the fireplace as Cassandra entered and she realised as she moved towards him that she was the first guest down to dinner.

“It seems I am a little early,” she said quickly.

“You could never be too early for me.”

As Lord Carwen spoke he took her hand and held it close against his lips.

Cassandra felt herself shiver from the warm possessiveness of his mouth, and she disliked even more the way his eyes looked at her. She thought she saw a touch of fire in them.

“You are very lovely,” he said, “and I cannot tell you how happy it makes me to have you here in my own house. We have a lot to say to each other, little Sandra.”

Cassandra was concerned with trying to take her hand from his grasp but he would not relinquish it.

“Please,” she said insistently, a flush coming to her cheeks.

“Are you afraid that the others will come in and see us?” Lord Carwen asked. “In that case, Sandra, later we will go somewhere quiet where we can get to know each other.”

He let her hand go as if reluctantly, and Cassandra walked quickly away from him towards the fireplace.

“I know,” Lord Carwen said following her and standing too close, “that we are going to mean a great deal to each other, you and I.”

“I think you are mistaken, My Lord,” Cassandra answered firmly.

“I am never mistaken where a pretty woman is concerned,” Lord Carwen said. “I knew as soon as I saw you, Sandra, you were someone I wished to know well—very well.”

Cassandra turned her head away from him to look into the flames.

“I have a present for you which I know will please you,” he said softly.

He looked at her bare neck and she felt as if he touched it with his fingers.

“You may tell me which is your favourite stone,” he went on, “but I have already decided that diamonds become you best.”

There was no mistaking the insinuation behind his words and Cassandra moving away from him said formally:

“I never accept presents from—strangers, My Lord.”

“We will not be strangers for long,” Lord Carwen smiled.

She thought there was a confidence about him that was unassailable. He was so sure of himself; so completely convinced that he could say or do as he wished and she would not rebuff him.

“I am afraid you are under a misapprehension,” Cassandra said. “I am here because I am a friend of the Duke. You invited us together and it was a great pleasure to drive here with him in his Phaeton. I hope that is clear?”

She wondered as she spoke if she had been too rude, considering that Lord Carwen was her host.

To her surprise he laughed!

“I like your spirit,” he said, “but I assure you you will find me very much more generous than Alchester can afford to be, and the more I see you the more I am convinced that we shall get along very well together.”

“You are mistaken, My Lord,” Cassandra said sharply.

Then to her relief the Drawing-Room door opened and the Duke came in.

She turned to him with what was almost a little cry of gladness and if she had not restrained herself, she would have run down the room to meet him.

She wanted to hold on to him to make sure he was there, to know that he would protect her, although she could hardly say that Lord Carwen’s advances had been actually menacing.

And yet she was afraid!

She knew that, even as the Duke came to her side, for some inexplicable reason she was really very frightened.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Dinner was not so noisy or so gay as Cassandra had expected.

Since there were extra men, some of them had to sit together and they instantly began to talk sport. Even the Earl of Wilmere’s normally unrestrained laughter seemed more subdued than it had earlier.

Cassandra was glad to find that she was not next to Lord Carwen.

Instead she was on the right of the Duke with a middle-aged man on her right. He was engrossed in talking about the shooting prospects for the coming year with the gentleman on his right.

Cassandra found herself thinking that the Duke was very quiet, and she fancied that when he was not actually speaking to her there was a frown between his eyes.

She wondered if it had anything to do with the conversation that had taken place when he had come into the Drawing-Room and found her alone with Lord Carwen.

She had been glad and relieved to see him, but she fancied that, as he advanced across the room, there was a grim expression on his face.

“I want to speak to you, Varro,” Lord Carwen said as he reached the hearth-rug.

The Duke did not answer. He merely looked at his host expectantly.

“De Veet has arrived and I want you to be nice to him.”

“I do not like him,” the Duke replied in an uncompromising voice.

“That is immaterial!” Lord Carwen retorted.

“On the contrary, I think it is very pertinent to the matter in question,” the Duke contradicted. “I am quite convinced that he is not to be trusted.”

“That may be your opinion,” Lord Carwen said, “but I have gone into the matter very thoroughly, and I can assure you, Varro, that your apprehensions are quite unfounded.”

The Duke walked nearer to the fireplace and stood holding his hands out towards the fire as if he felt cold.

Then he said quietly:

“I am still not interested, Carwen.”

Cassandra saw an expression of anger in Lord Carwen’s eyes.

“Now look here, Varro—” he began, but before he could say any more the door opened to admit a number of other members of the house-party.

Several new guests appeared to have arrived while they were changing for dinner. Among them was Mr. De Veet, who, Cassandra learned, was a South African.

He was a heavy, coarse man, flashily dressed, who spoke with a decided accent. Looking at him perceptively, Cassandra was certain the Duke was right and he was not to be trusted.

She wondered why Lord Carwen was so anxious for the Duke to be nice to Mr. De Veet.

She came to the conclusion there must be some matter of business involved, because Lord Carwen himself went out of his way to be almost over-effusive to his guest.

At dinner Mr. De Veet had two of the prettiest women in the party on either side of him.

Later, when Lord Carwen’s theatrical guests arrived from London, it was obvious that the party was to be paired off, every man being more or less allotted a particular woman in whom he either already had, or was expected to take, an interest.

Dinner was so long drawn out with many courses, and the gentlemen lingered so long over their Port, that there was in fact little time to wait before Lily Langtry arrived with Freddy Gebhard.

They were followed shortly by the ladies of the theatre who, Cassandra learned, had been conveyed to the country by Lord Carwen’s fastest horses.

Mrs. Langtry was looking very beautiful.

She arrived wearing full evening-dress with magnificent jewellery, and she looked so elegant without a hair out of place that she might have stepped from behind the footlights into the Drawing-Room.

Everyone present paid her extravagant compliments and she greeted Cassandra with a charming smile, although it was obvious she was surprised to find she was staying in the house.

“I am grateful to you, Lily, for introducing me to the entrancing Sandra,” Lord Carwen said. “But then your taste has always been impeccable.”

“I understood it was Varro she wished to meet,” Mrs. Langtry replied, with what Cassandra felt was a hint of mischief in her eyes.

“Varro is also here,” Lord Carwen remarked.

“How kind of you,” Mrs. Langtry said with a little smile.

Cassandra thought there was a suggestion of sarcasm in her voice.

As soon as everyone had arrived, a room off the Drawing-Room was opened to reveal a roulette table, in addition to which the guests could play Baccarat or Bridge.

It was obvious, Cassandra noticed, that the women were carrying no money with them and that the gentlemen were expected to act as their backers.

A great number of golden sovereigns were soon lying on the green-baize tables.

“Do you want to play?” the Duke asked.

Cassandra shook her head.

“I hate gambling!”

“Then let us sit by the fire,” he suggested, and they remained behind in the Drawing-Room while the rest of the party clustered round the tables in the Card-Room.

“I think I shall go to bed soon,” Cassandra said. ‘This is my third night of gaiety and I feel rather tired.”

“You certainly do not show it,” the Duke answered.

He looked at her sitting in a chair which framed the soft ivory lace of her gown. The golden lights in her red hair glittered in the candlelight and her eyes were very blue.

It seemed as if there was little they had to say to each other, and yet Cassandra knew it was a joy beyond words to be with him; to feel that they were together, although they were surrounded by other people and in the house of a man she disliked.

She had a feeling the Duke was thinking the same thing.

Suddenly feeling shy of the expression in his eyes, she turned her head away to look into the fire.

“I was very happy today,” the Duke said softly.

“It was ... something I have never done ... before,” Cassandra said without thinking.

“What have you never done before?” the Duke enquired.

“Driven alone with a man and had luncheon at an Inn.”

She was speaking more to herself than to him, and then she feared he might think it strange that as an actress she should not find such occasions quite ordinary.

He was about to say something when Lord Carwen came back into the Drawing-Room.

“I wondered what had happened to you both,” he said.

His tone was not accusing but perfectly pleasant.

“I do not gamble,” Cassandra said quickly.

“Perhaps you do not know how to do so,” Lord Carwen suggested. “Let me be your instructor.”

“No, thank you,” Cassandra replied. “Quite frankly I think it is a silly way of passing the time, when one might be talking or reading or doing something else more interesting.”

“There I agree with you,” Lord Carwen smiled.

He turned to the Duke.

“Varro, if you are really determined not to do as I have asked you with regard to De Veet, will you have a word with him? He has just told me that he is counting on you, so, if you have really changed your mind, I feel it would be a mistake to leave him in ignorance.”

“I have not changed my mind,” the Duke answered. “I told you from the beginning I did not wish to be associated with him.”

“I am afraid I did not understand that,” Lord Carwen said. “In fact I told De Veet that you would represent me on his Board.”

“That is something I have no intention of doing,” the Duke said sharply.

“Then, my dear fellow, you must make your attitude clear to De Veet. He is suffering under the same misapprehension as I was, that you were definitely interested in his proposition. I think you had better tell him now—at once—before things go any further.”

“I should have thought tomorrow would be soon enough!”

Lord Carwen shook his head.

“If you are not prepared to play ball, dear boy, then I have every intention of asking Wilmere. He has been badgering me for some time to put him in touch with just such a chance to make money.”

The Duke rose slowly to his feet.

“Very well, I will speak to De Veet. Are you coming with me, Sandra?”

“Yes, of course,” she answered.

She rose and moved towards the Duke, then as he turned towards the door into the Card-Room, Lord Carwen said:

“One moment, Sandra, I have something to show you.”

Both Cassandra and the Duke stopped still.

“What is it?” Cassandra asked.

“Nothing more sensational,” Lord Carwen replied with a twist of his lips, “than a plan of my Estate. You were talking to Colonel Henderson about it at dinner, I believe.”

“Yes, I was,” Cassandra answered. “Did he tell you so?”

“He told me that you were interested in my Point-to-Point Course that has been spoken of as a model of its land. It certainly commanded a great deal of attention last week when we had our first meeting.”

“Colonel Henderson described it to me,” Cassandra said. “He told me your horses won two races.”

“I should really thank Varro for that,” Lord Carwen said agreeably. “He sold me the hunters and I was very pleased with their performance.”

Cassandra glanced at the Duke and knew without his saying anything how much he must have disliked having to part with his precious hunters. Once again he must have been in pressing need of the money.

“I have the plans here on my desk,” Lord Carwen said. “Let me show them to you.”

There was nothing Cassandra could do but agree, and reluctantly the Duke walked away from her and into the Card-Room.

Cassandra had no wish to be alone with Lord Carwen, but she felt she could not refuse to look at his plans without being extremely rude.

Moreover it was unlikely that he would try to be over-familiar when the rest of the party were in the next room and might interrupt them at any moment.

Lord Carwen drew from the drawer of a bureau inlaid with ivory a plan which was headed “The Lord Carwen Point-to-Point, March 15th, 1886.”

“Now let me show you why this is different from the usual Point-to-Point Course—” Lord Carwen began conversationally.

He spread the plan out as he spoke, and Cassandra with her experience of her father’s private Steeple-Chase Course at The Towers realised that it was in fact very well planned.

“Unlike most Point-to-Points,” Lord Carwen continued, “the
Judges here can keep an eye on the Competitors the whole way round, and of course it is more interesting for the spectators.”

“What you have really devised,” Cassandra said, “is a racecourse.”

“I suppose that is true,” Lord Carwen said, “but I am not particularly interested in racing as such. It is Varro who thinks only of the ‘Sport of Kings’.”

“His father’s horses were famous,” Cassandra said, almost as if she were defending the Duke.

“Would you like to own a race-horse of your own?” Lord Carwen asked.

“Not particularly,” Cassandra answered.

She wondered what Lord Carwen would say if she told him that her father owned a large number of race-horses and had promised her that as soon as she was twenty-one that she could race under her own colours.

“I wonder what you would like to possess,” Lord Carwen said.

Cassandra did not answer.

She was aware that he was looking at her with that expression in his eyes which she most disliked. So she merely bent her head over the plans on the desk.

She traced with the tip of her finger the course the riders would follow; noted the height of the jumps; and was certain that they would prove of little difficulty as far as her new horses, Firefly and Andora, were concerned.

Lord Carwen suddenly set down in front of her on the plan an open jewel-case.

In it lay a broad diamond bracelet glittering in the light from the Chandelier.

For an instant Cassandra was still. Then she said coldly:

“I have already told you, My Lord, that I do not accept presents from strangers.”

“I am not a stranger,” Lord Carwen answered, “and you know as well as I do that diamonds are something every sensible girl should collect, besides being vastly becoming to a skin as white as yours.”

“Thank you,” Cassandra replied, “but my answer is no.”

She would have turned away, but Lord Carwen caught her by the wrist.

“When you are as sweet to me as I wish you to be,” he said softly, “I will give you a necklace to match the bracelet.”

“You seem to find it very difficult to understand plain English,” Cassandra replied. “How can I make you realise, My Lord, that I will not accept a gift of any sort from you? No diamonds, however large, however expensive, will tempt me to alter my decision.”

“I suppose you fancy yourself in love with Varro?” Lord Carwen said, and now there was something like a snarl in his voice.

“That has nothing to do with it!”

“I think it has,” Lord Carwen insisted. “But let me inform you that Varro can give you nothing while I am a very generous man!”

Cassandra tried to release herself but his fingers were still clasped tightly around her wrist.