The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [130]
‘You – you really think so?’ stammered George. ‘Perhaps you're right. Perhaps it won't ever get out. I d-don't think I could bear it if it did. If it does… Ash, honestly now, w-what would you do, if you were me?’
‘Shoot myself,’ said Ash unkindly. ‘Goodbye George.’
He leapt down the verandah steps and was driven back to the Club where he collected his horse and rode over to the Harlowes' bungalow; and for once luck seemed to be with him, for Belinda's parents were still out, while she herself had returned and was resting. The bearer, roused from his afternoon nap, was loath to disturb her, but when Ash threatened to walk in on her himself he hurried away and tapped on her door, telling her that a Sahib had called to see her and would not go away until he had done so. But when Belinda entered the drawing-room some five minutes later it was instantly and painfully clear that she had expected to see someone entirely different. She ran gaily into the room and then stopped dead, the smile wiped from her pretty face and her eyes widening in apprehension and anger.
‘Ashton! What are you doing here?’
Something in her voice and expression daunted Ash and he said uncertainly, stammering a little, as George too had stammered: ‘I – had to see you, darling. Your m-mother wrote to me. She said you were… you were engaged to be married. It isn't true is it?’
Belinda did not answer the question. She said instead: ‘You shouldn't have come here. You know quite well you should not. Please go, Ashton. Papa will only be angry if he comes back and finds you here. Abdul should never have let you in. Now do go.’
‘Is it true?’ repeated Ash, ignoring the appeal.
Belinda stamped her foot: ‘I asked you to go, Ashton. You've no right to come forcing your way in here and cross-questioning me when you know I'm alone and –’ She shrank away as Ash came towards her, but he walked past her without touching her, and closing the door, locked it and put the key into his pocket and went back to stand between her and the french windows, blocking her retreat.
Belinda opened her mouth to call the bearer and then closed it again, daunted by the prospect of embroiling one of the servants in such an embarrassing situation. An interview with Ashton, however distasteful, seemed the lesser of two evils – and as she would probably have to endure one sooner or later, she might as well get it over now. So she smiled at him and said coaxingly: ‘Please don't let's have a scene, Ashton. I know you must feel badly about it. That's why I asked Mama to write – because I couldn't bear to be the one to hurt you. But you must have realized by now that when we first met we were both much too young to know our own minds, and that we'd grow out of it, just like Papa said.’
‘Are you going to marry that man Podmore?’ asked Ash stonily.
‘If you mean Mr Podmore-Smyth, yes, I am. And you needn't use that tone of voice either, because –’
‘But my darling, you can't let yourself be bullied into this. Do you think I don't know that this is all your father's doing? You were in love with me – you were going to marry me – and now he's forcing you into this. Why don't you stand up for yourself? Oh Belinda, darling, can't you see?’
‘Yes, I can,’ said Belinda crossly. ‘I can see that you don't know anything about it, for if you must know, Papa was very much against it. And Mama too. But I'm not seventeen any longer: I shall be nineteen this year and quite old enough to know my own mind, so there was really nothing they could do about it, and in the end they had to agree, because Ambrose –’
‘Are you trying to pretend that you're in love with him?’ interrupted Ash harshly.
‘Of course I'm in love with him. You don't suppose that I'd marry him if I wasn't?’
‘You can't be. It isn't true. That