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The door opened and Sven came into the room. Starting guiltily, she explained, 'I ... I was just unpacking your things.'

'You are taking your wifely duties very seriously.' Was there a gibe in his voice? 'But I would rather you did not pry into my private papers.'

'I wasn't prying. This'—she still held the passport, 'fell out, and now we're married you shouldn't have secrets from me. But you lied to me, telling me you were Swedish.'

He walked across to her and tweaked the passport from her hand, throwing it upon the bed.

'I never actually told you so. You surmised it.'

'As you meant me to. There wasn't really any difficulty about us skating together, was there? But I don't understand why you posed as Swedish and kept your foreign name.'

He looked at her quizzically. 'I kept it because I have always been known by it. Ingrid and I won our championship for Sweden in our teens. I was Sven then and it has stuck. When I came of age, I could claim British nationality because I was born here of an English mother, and since my parents had discarded me, I did, under the name of Steve Peterson. Since then I have skated for Great Britain, as you would know if you read the papers instead of those trashy novels.'

'But you misled me when you pretended we couldn't be selected for the British team. Wasn't that your reason for marrying me?'

'Anger suits you,' he said calmly. 'You look quite beautiful.'

Her eyes flashed. She was not going to be diverted by compliments.

'You can't deny you deliberately deceived me.'

'Of course I did. All is fair in love and war. Your ignorance was my trump card. Can you blame me for playing it?'

She stared at him, bewildered. So her father, Jan, everyone else had known, and surmising she did too, had never thought to mention it. Sven had told her to leave all problems to him, and this was how he had solved them.

'But... but we needn't have married.'

'There were other reasons.'

'There were lots of other reasons from Daddy's point of view, but I can't see what you're gaining other than a skating partner, which you could have obtained by less drastic methods.'

'Don't you?' he asked softly.

'Unless it was because I'm Daddy's heir.'

It was out, the niggling doubt that refused to be entirely quenched, the dread that Sven's motives were mercenary.

His face hardened and a glint of anger kindled in his eyes. 'I have told you what has been arranged about that,' he said coldly. 'But whatever you think will not make any difference now. You are married to me, and you will have to make the best of me.'

Sonya quivered at the masterful note in his voice, but made one last protest. 'If only you'd been honest ...' she began, but he swooped forward and pulled her into his arms.

'Stop talking,' he commanded, and closed her lips with his.

Enraged, she fought against his imprisoning embrace, but he was far too strong for her to be able to free herself. Then her senses took command and her limbs seemed to turn to jelly as he kissed her without mercy, crushing her slight body, until she begged him to stop. He released her, breathing hard. His eyes were a vivid blue, his nostrils flaring.

'You must be taught who is master,' he told her hoarsely. 'Tonight, my little spitfire, I will continue the lesson, but now we have to be presentable for your father's dinner party or I would not let you off so easily.'

As Sonya's racing pulses slowed she became aware of a growing unease. Sven could subdue her by the strength of his passion, but even her untutored mind knew it was not enough. Without respect and true affection mere fulfilment of sexual desire would soon pall. She wanted to look up to Sven, but he had shown
himself to be devious, even unscrupulous—or so it seemed to her.

He left her to go and shower and she hastily put on her dinner dress, a classical model in draped green silk. Round her neck she clasped the filigree silver necklace Sven had given her for the occasion. It was, he had told her, Scandinavian workmanship.

Eliot looked a little flushed when he came to dinner, but for once Sonya was too preoccupied by her husband to notice it. He sat opposite her with her father at the head of the table and he had never looked more handsome, his narrow eyes a brilliant blue, his face animated as he talked and laughed, telling anecdotes about his skating colleagues with wit and verve. Eliot laughed immoderately at his sallies, many of the persons being known to him. Sonya said very little and ate sparingly, but she drank several glasses of the champagne which her father had provided. After Eliot had gone to bed she would be exposed to the full force of Sven's barely concealed passion which he would no longer be obliged to restrain. Like many controlled natures, once the flood was released it would be overwhelming. She was both excited and apprehensive.

Eliot called the Mathesons in at the end of the meal to again drink their health and compliment Katie on her excellent cooking. Mingled with their congratulations were good wishes for their success at the Canadian sports.

Then Katie returned to her kitchen, Matheson took Eliot upstairs after he had kissed his daughter, saying:

'We'll say goodnight now,' he glanced slyly at Sven. 'You'll have other things to think of tonight, my child, without coming in to see me.'

An air of constraint fell upon the couple left in the sitting room. Sven sat down on the couch, remarking:

'I think we must have a television. Would your father mind very much? We could have it in one of the upstairs rooms.'

'I'm sure he'd rather have it in here than that we should leave him on his own,' Sonya told him, foreseeing problems. Sven would not want to always be one of a threesome.

He looked round the room. 'This house is a bit antiquated,' he observed. 'When did you last have anything modern?'

Sonya saw his point. Since they were to make their home with Eliot, he would not object to innovations, she was sure. Anything to keep them contented, and he himself had lost all interest since her mother died. She asked what improvements Sven would suggest to renovate the sitting room and soon they both became absorbed in replanning the decorations—light curtains and carpet, wooden Swedish furniture, possibly another window at the side, and a more modern grate. Sonya sat beside him on the couch as he demonstrated his ideas with a pencil and paper, her apprehensions forgotten. For the first time they were in companionable harmony without emotional tension.

It was late when Sven looked at his watch and remarked :

'Bedtime, little wife.'

Instantly all her shyness returned. It was only a long time later that she appreciated that he had purposely introduced his renovation plans to restore her confidence and lessen her nervousness. But he had not wholly succeeded.

'I... I'll go up first,' she faltered.

'Please, am I to forgo the privilege of undressing my bride?'

Her face flamed scarlet. 'Must you?'

'Little prude!' He laughed and drew her arm through his. 'From now on we will be together always.'

When they reached the bedroom, his mood seemed to have changed. No longer was he the dominant male demanding her subservience, but gentle. He took off his tie and jacket and came to her where she stood trembling by the bed.

'Don't be frightened, little one,' he said kindly. 'There is no need to be. I promise I will keep my devil on the leash and I will try not to hurt you.' He pulled down the zip of her dress and it fell about her feet, disclosing her bare shoulders, naked except for her bra and panties. Tenderly he drew his lips across their ivory smoothness. 'You know that as you are a virgin there will be a little pain?' he warned her, wondering if she knew what to expect.

She nodded dumbly, feeling the dark flood of desire rising within her, and reached for her nightgown laid out on the bed.

'You will not need that,' he told her, and again her face flamed. Naked they would lie together, and in anticipation she could feel his hard muscular body pressing down upon her own.

The long-drawn howl of an anguished dog rang through the silent house.

'What on earth?' Sven exclaimed, glancing towards the door.

But Sonya knew what it presaged. She snatched up her dressing gown and wrapping it about her ran out
into the passage. Matheson was coming out of her father's room.

'Katie's ringing for the doctor,' he told her, 'but I'm afraid ...'

Sonya pushed past him into the room. Tessa was crouched whimpering on the floor. Eliot lay back against his heaped pillows with his eyes closed, breathing in short gasps, but the shadow of death lay on his pallid features.

Sonya knelt beside the bed, taking his limp hand in hers; there was only the thread of a pulse.

The doctor came, and shook his head. Useless to try and move him, he was nearly gone. To try to get him to hospital would only hasten the end. He looked at Sven who had come in and was trying to comfort the whining dog.

'Get her to bed and I will give you some sleeping pills for her to take.' Matheson had told him that the two were married. 'What an ending to her wedding day, poor girl!'

But Sonya refused to move, and Sven was loth to use force.

'I can't desert him now,' she said.

She remained kneeling by the bed, as her father's hand grew cold in hers. Katie removed the unhappy dog, and Sven waited. Dr Travers had left; he had to go to a confinement.

'One goes, another comes,' he remarked drily.

At about four o'clock, the hour when vitality is at its lowest, Sven gently detached Sonya's fingers from their hold and drew the sheet over her father's face.

'He has gone, my dear, and you are chilled to the bone. Let me take you to bed.'

She looked at him vaguely, too numb to comprehend her loss.

'I want to be here when he wakes.'

'He will not wake, at least not in this world.'

He carried her back to their room and laid her on the bed. Matheson, who had been watching, brought a hot water bottle and brandy. Sven gently massaged her hands and feet. There was no hint of passion about him now, he was a nurse tending a bereaved child. Finally he gathered her into his arms and sought to break through the terrible numbness which enwrapped her. It was left to another to do that. Tessa came creeping in through the door which Matheson had left half closed, having escaped Katie's vigilance. She jumped on to the bed and howled. Sonya drew herself away from Sven and gathered the animal to her. Then her inertia broke, and she was racked by terrible sobbing. Sven sought to soothe her with hands and voice, pushing the dog aside. Sonya clung to him, responding to his warm human sympathy, though he did not think she knew who he was. Finally her weeping ceased, and exhausted she fell asleep. Sven laid her back on her pillows, and drew the coverings over her. Tessa lay at her feet. He stood for a while regarding her curly head and tear-stained face with a wry smile. Turning to go his feet became entangled in her discarded dress. As he picked it up his smile became more crooked. In their unconscious duel for Sonya's love, Eliot had won. Sven laid it on a chair and went to the bathroom to bath and change before another day.

Eliot Vincent was buried on a raw January day, but Sonya was not present at the funeral. She was in a state of collapse. The excitement of her wedding following weeks of hard work and then the shock of her father's death had prostrated her.

Unfortunately in her morbid condition she turned against her husband. He had distracted her on her father's last evening so that she had not noticed he was looking ill. She had not gone in to him to say goodnight when she might have seen he was on the verge of an attack. That he had forbidden her to do so and Matheson was always on the alert she chose to ignore. She recalled that when Eliot had had his previous attack she had been absent dancing with Sven, and he had been making love to her when her father was dying. Being beyond all reason, she blamed him for her neglect.

Eliot was moved to the mortuary on the morning of his death. When Sonya woke, she had Katie make up his bed and moved her things into his room. With the sensitivity which had caused her to be so receptive to Sven's tuition, she declared she could still feel Eliot's presence in the room and she wanted to be with him.

Meeting her carrying an armful of her possessions to his room, Sven had tried to remonstrate with her.

'Darling, you cannot sleep in there alone.'

'I'll have Tessa, and I have to make up for deserting him.' She did not notice that for the first time he had called her darling.

'But, Sonya, he is not there.'

She smiled faintly. 'That's all you know.'

Since she would not listen to him, he took her in his arms, but she was like a zombie in his hold, completely unaware of him.

Stanley Matheson said to him: 'Best humour her, sir, she'll get over it in time, but she's had a severe
shock. They were all in all to each other, those two.'

Information Sven did not find comforting. He could only hope that when Sonya had got over her obsession she would turn to him again. Meanwhile, with his attempts at sympathy repulsed, and the reproach in her eyes whenever she looked at him, it was only natural that he should seek more congenial company' elsewhere. When Sonya retired to her father's bedroom with the dog, Sven went out.

In due course Mr Foster came to acquaint them with the contents of Eliot Vincent's will. He had left substantial bequests to the Mathesons and Jan van Goort, but the bulk of his estate was to be divided equally between Sven and Sonya with reversion to their children. He had done this, Mr Foster explained, so Sven should not be dependent upon his wife, which was a humiliating position for a man. The house was to go to both of them. This was not at all what Sven had told Sonya he had agreed with her father if he married her, but it transpired Eliot had made a new will on their wedding day. It was what he had been doing on that last afternoon.

'It's quite valid,' Mr Foster said. 'It will take a long time for his trusts and investments to be wound up, but you will each inherit a very considerable sum of money, and of course in the meantime I can advance you anything you may require.'