The Far Pavilions - Mary Margaret Kaye [131]
The blood rushed up into Belinda's face and quite suddenly Ash remembered what George had said about her losing her prettiness and looking ugly. She had lost it now and her voice was strident and furious:
‘He's not as old as my father! He's not. How dare you talk to me like that? You're jealous of him because he's a man of the world – because he's mature and interesting and successful. Someone I can rely on and look up to, and not a silly, callow boy who – She checked and bit her lip, and controlling herself with an effort said in a more reasonable voice: ‘I'm sorry, Ashton. But it makes me so angry when people say things like that. After all, you were just as angry when Papa thought you were too young. You said age had nothing to do with it, remember? and it's true. Ambrose understands me, and he's kind and generous and clever and everyone says that he's bound to be a Governor. He might even be Viceroy one day.’
‘And I gather he's rich as well.’
Belinda missed the sarcasm and accepting the comment at its face value said happily: ‘Yes, he is. He's given me such lovely presents. Look.’
She held out her left hand in unaffected pleasure and Ash saw with a pang that it was adorned with a band of enormous diamonds, any one of which was at least twice the size of the pearls in that pretty but unpretentious ring that he had bought for her in Delhi over a year and a half ago. It seemed much longer than that; five years at least. Too long for Belinda, who was going to marry a man old enough to be her father. A fat, rich, successful widower who could give her diamonds and make her Lady Podmore-Smyth – and present her with two ready-made step-children the same age as herself.
There appeared to be nothing left to say. The sight of those diamonds on Belinda's finger proved that all the arguments and pleas that he had meant to use would be a waste of time, and all he could do now was to wish her happiness and go. It was strange to think that he had planned to spend his whole life with her and that now he was probably seeing her for the last time. Outwardly she was as pink and white and pretty as ever, yet it was obvious that he had really never known what went on inside that golden head, but had fallen in love with someone who had existed largely in his imagination.
He said slowly: ‘I suppose I've been doing it too. Inventing stories to suit myself and make me feel more comfortable, just like George did.’
Belinda stiffened, and once again, and shockingly, her face was scarlet with anger and her voice high-pitched and shrewish: ‘Don't you speak to me about George. He's nothing but a low-bred, lying hypocrite. All those stories about a Greek grandmother -’
Something in Ash's face checked her and she broke off and gave a shrill laugh that was as ugly as her voice: ‘Oh, I forgot you wouldn't know about that. Well, I'll tell you. She was no more Greek than I am. She was a bazaar woman and if he thinks I'm going to keep my mouth shut, he's mistaken.’
Ash said haltingly, through stiff lips: ‘You can't. You don't mean it… You couldn't…’
Belinda laughed again, her eyes bright with anger and malice. ‘Oh, yes I could. And I have, too. Do you think I'm going to sit and wait until someone else finds out and starts telling everyone, and people begin laughing at me and Mama behind our backs, and sympathizing with us for being taken in? I'd rather die! I shall tell them myself; I shall tell them that I always suspected it and that I trapped him into admitting it, and -’
Her voice was shaking with resentment and wounded vanity, and Ash could only stare at her, appalled, while her pretty pink mouth went on and on manufacturing malice and pouring out spite as though she could not stop herself. Had he been older and wiser, and less badly hurt himself, he might have recognized it for what it was: a tantrum thrown by a spoilt child who has been courted and flattered and over-indulged to a point where good sense and youthful high-spirits have turned to conceit and vanity, and any