Call Back Yesterday (1978)Charlotte Lamb

What was his realreason for coming?

'The last person in the world I wantedto see was you, Devil Haggard," Orielsaid huskily. "If you ever lay hands onme again I'll sue you for assault"

He lazily took her by the shoulders."Like this, you mean?"

"Let me go," she whispered, her eyeshelplessly fixed on his mouth.

It came down toward her and her evesclosed Involuntarily even as her lipsparted hungrily beneath thepressure of his. without volition herhands crept up and curved aroundhis neck.

She knew then, that in spite of all thathad gone before, she loved him asmuch as ever....

CHAPTER ONE

THE long steel-blue limousine swung effortlessly at speed through the battered gates, along the moss- starred gravel of the

drive, bumping over the potholes and stones which made the surface so uneven, and drew up outside the house. There were people moving in and out of the open front door. They turned to stare curiously. The whispers ran like mice around the walls as she was recognised.

The chauffeur walked round and opened the door. Her companion descended first, then turned and bent a solicitous back as he handed her out. The little crowd which had gathered watched at a distance. Long, sleek, silk-clad legs, their lithe elegance enhanced by their golden tan; slender ankles and small, expensively shod feet; narrow hips and tiny waist, small, high breasts which were emphasised by the deep V of her tight-fitting black dress, she emerged slowly and gracefully. Her face was shadowed by a wide-brimmed, tilted black and white hat, but they could see the long, firm line of a red mouth above a very determined chin.

She stood there for a moment, looking up at the facade of the old building. Her hidden eyes travelled over the classically proportioned windows and doors which marked the house as having been built at the peak of the Georgian period. Neglect and weather had besieged Chantries during the last ten years, but nothing could seriously blemish its beauty. Even though there were slates missing from the roof, broken windows, warped doors, the house shone triumphant through it all.

'Not bad,' her companion murmured discreetly in her ear.She turned and surveyed him thoughtfully. 'You like it?'

'Very much.''The auction begins in half an hour,' she said. 'We just have

time to look around.'

'I would like that,' he said, then stopped as a low murmur came from the crowd, a murmur of excitement which was transmuted into a listening silence as the woman in black turned slowly to look up the drive in the direction in which they all stared.

A horse was cantering easily along the rough grass verge, his silken black shoulders gleaming in the afternoon sun.

A man sat on his back, a man who, at first glance, appeared almost to be part of him, so effortlessly did he move with his mount. He was a man as powerful as the horse, broad in the shoulder and slim in the waist, with a leonine head of hair as black as the stallion's coat, hair which blew back in the wind of his passing, revealing his strongly marked features.

He wore a white shirt, open at the throat, and well-washed old beige riding breeches. He looked like a farmer, but his air of arrogant command seemed to suggest otherwise. Alan Kennet, studying him, thought that he had seen city tycoons who might have envied that hard assurance.

As the black stallion drew level with the woman, the rider reined in and sat staring down at her. Alan could not see her face beneath that damned hat. He wondered what she was thinking. Why was that man staring in that insolent fashion?

1

After what seemed an eternity, the stallion suddenly swung away and the horse and rider disappeared through an arched gate at the side of the house. The crowd let out a long sigh, still watching the woman eagerly. Beneath the shadow of that hat nothing could be seen of her. She moved towards the front door. Alan moved at her side, a slight frown on his face.

'Who was that?' he asked carefully. 'Did you know him?'

She paused in the great panelled hall, glancing up at the ceiling which was quatrefoiled in white and blue, with gold bosses at the intersecting points of the circles. The brim of the hat lifted to reveal a fine-boned, cool face, made mysterious by slanting green eyes of a pale almond colour, their eyebrows thinly arched and pencilled below a high, pale brow. Her ash-blonde hair was drawn back from her face and swathed in a silky smooth chignon at the back of her neck.

She consulted the catalogue she held. 'This ceiling is older than the house, apparently. It was transferred from a house that stood here originally in the sixteenth century. It looks to be in good condition.'

'Oriel,' Alan said. 'Oriel, why do you want this house? Why buy a house out here in Yorkshire, so far from London? It's so remote.' His eyes moved up the great, sweeping staircase. 'And so big. A weekend cottage I could understand ... but this place? You already have Egon's house in Hampshire. You can't need a house this size. Unless you're going to sell the house in Hampshire?'

'No,' she said, shaking her head. 'Anatole may want to have that house when he's grown up. Egon loved it so much. I think Anatole must be allowed to say what happens to his father's house. For the present, I shall let it. Egon's American foundation want to use it as a base for their U.K. operations—it's always useful to have a country house for conferences and visiting V.I.P.s to stay at.'

Alan took off his spectacles and swung them thoughtfully from finger and thumb, staring at the ground. When did you set this up? You've never mentioned it before.'

She glanced at him, a mischievous light in her green eyes. 'I know you're my accountant, Alan, but I am capable of making some decisions without your advice. Believe me, I shall be very careful. Boltson has drawn up a watertight agreement. All my rights in the house are guaranteed and the lease is only for five years. I'm charging them an exorbitant rent, too, which will, of course, all go into Anatole's trust fund.''So it's all settled?''Don't sulk,' she said lightly, patting his arm.

'I'm not in the habit of sulking,' Alan said with a glance of offence.

She laughed. 'If you could see your face I Alan, you know I value your advice, but some things I can and must do for myself. Settling my future home is one of them.'

'But why this place?' He returned to his original question. 'It's in a very poor state of repair. It's miles from anywhere. And it's much too big for you. You'll need servants to run it.' He hesitated, then added softly, 'I thought you would take a flat in London, somewhere like Mayfair perhaps, a service flat with a couple of bedrooms.'

She grimaced. 'I detest London, and I would loathe a flat. I want a home of my own.'

'But why in God's name this place?' His voice was taut with irritation as he glanced around at the peeling wallpaper of the long sitting-room they had just entered. 'This place is damp and probably riddled with woodworm.'

'Oh, I agree,' she said. 'But you see, Alan, I was born here, and to me that makes it the most desirable residence in the world.'

He stared incredulously at her back as she moved across the room to run a loving hand along the huge, carved oak fireplace. 'You were born here? Do you mean in this house?'

She nodded. Her voice was beautiful, perhaps the most beautiful part of her, a sweet, cool voice which affected everyone who heard it. 'Chantries is where I grew up. I lived here for the first seventeen years of my life.'

'It belonged to your family?' Alan frowned, staring at the catalogue. 'It says here that it's been in the possession of the Haggard family for two hundred years. I thought your maiden name was Malving.'

'The last owner, Jeremiah Haggard, was my mother's cousin. When my mother died, my father went to Africa to plant rubber trees and Jeremiah became my guardian. I was too young to live with my father—Africa isn't the best place to bring up a child. Jeremiah engaged a nurse and later a gover-ness, and I stayed here.'

'Until you were seventeen, you said?' Alan suddenly remembered having heard that she married her husband in Africa. 'And then you joined your father?'

She nodded. 'And when I was eighteen I married Egon.'Alan stared around the room. The windows were grimy and

cobwebbed, but their height gave elegance to the long saloon, and the faded damask curtains had a shabby beauty. 'You'll have to spend a fortune getting it back into shape. Have you had it surveyed?'

She smiled. 'I didn't bother. I shall buy it whatever condition it's in.'

He grimaced. 'All the same..But he did not go on, for he knew that Egon Mellstock's widow need never concern herself

with the cost of anything. Her husband's African assets had included copper and diamond mines, plantations and factories and a large share of the profits of a huge international consortium based in Africa. Egon had left most of these to his only son, Oriel's child, Anatole, who was at present in the adoring care of his grandmother, Renée Mellstock, in London.

Egon Mellstock had been fifty when he married Oriel. She was his fourth wife. None of the previous wives had given him a child, and it had been her triumph in giving birth to a son that had left her in sole control of the Mellstock fortune at Egon's death two years earlier. The marriage had been strangely happy, considering the vast difference in age between husband and wife. Egon worshipped the girl who had given him the son he had desired so long, and Renée Mellstock could not say enough in praise of the daughter-in-law who had managed to be the first to make Egon's home life happy.

Alan knew that Egon's reputation, until his marriage with Oriel, had been that of a man with a trigger temper, harsh and demanding as an employer, irritable and neglectful as a husband. There had been cynical amusement when he married a young girl. For a long time she had been called the child bride, and Egon had once smashed the camera of a photographer who tried to capture a photograph of them together; the slender, lovely young girl beside the short, greying millionaire who might have been her father.

Alan had even heard that when she gave birth to her son, Egon had had blood tests taken to prove his paternity. Within three years, however, the child had manifested his inheritance by becoming astonishingly like his father; the same bullet-head, the same pale blue eyes and beak-like nose, the same stature

and build. As time passed no one questioned Anatole's paternity. He carried the proof in his face.

Egon adored him. The child might have been thoroughly spoilt, had it not been for his mother's firmness in refusing to allow it. Even so, everywhere that Egon went his son went with him, and when Egon died shortly after the boy's ninth birthday, Anatole had been heartbroken. For the past two years Oriel had devoted herself to allaying that grief. They had remained at their Hampshire home, surrounded by reminders of Egon, and gradually Alan had seen the boy's misery dissolve until he now accepted his father's death and was able to face the future calmly.

They moved back into the hall, then crossed over into the long saloon which was shortly to be the scene of the auction. It was already crowded. Most of the people, Alan suspected, were onlookers here to enjoy the excitement of the bidding. He glanced around and saw curious eyes fixed on Oriel. She stood out in this room, a swan among a flock of ducks. Her expensive clothes, her sophisticated air, her cool self-assurance and beauty, attracted instant attention.

Suddenly Alan saw the man who had ridden up on the black stallion. He was leaning at the back of the room, his arms folded, staring with a scowl at the ceiling.

'If you were such a close relative, why didn't your cousin Jeremiah leave the house to you?' he asked Oriel.

She smiled. 'He died without making a will, and the house went to his nephew Jack, who lives in Canada. Jack immediately put Chantries on the market. He doesn't want to come back here. He needs the money.''Why didn't he offer it to you in the first place?'

'Jack never liked me,' she shrugged. 'He knew I would want Chantries, but he didn't trust me to give him a fair price, perhaps, or he wanted to make it difficult for me to get what I wanted, so he stipulated an auction. He may get a higher price.' Her long lashes lowered against her cheeks. 'He had at least one very good offer, apart from mine. He presumably thought the bidding would go even higher in open auction.''Do you know who else is in the bidding?' asked Alan curiously.Her long red mouth tightened. 'Oh, yes,' she said.'Who?' Alan asked.She shrugged. 'It doesn't matter. You'll soon see.'There was a rustle of interest as two men came into the room and walked up to the dais on which a desk had been placed so as to command a view of everyone in the room.Under his breath, Alan said, 'I suppose you know quite a lot of these local people, even after twelve years?'Oriel smiled. 'Of course.''And they remember you?''Some of them.''You must have changed,' he said thoughtfully. 'What were you like at seventeen?''A gawky pony-tailed teenager, I suppose,' she said. Her eyes were enigmatic as she glanced around the room. Quietly she added, 'A little over-intense, a little inclined to dramatise myself.'

'I can't imagine you as anything but cool and collected,' Alan said disbelievingly.She smiled. 'Thank you.'

The auctioneer slammed his hammer down with a thud, and everyone sat up straight and looked at him. He gave a little

bow. 'Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I am glad to see so many people here. As you will know, we are here to offer a most desirable property known as The Chantries, built 1800, but incorporating earlier building remaining from a house believed to have been erected in the late sixteenth century, which burned down partially in 1793 ...' He droned on quoting from the cata-logue they all held, then came at last to a stop. 'I am instructed that my client will not sell below his reserve price of fifty thousand pounds. I will therefore open the bidding with that in mind.'

There was a silence. Everyone waited. Then a stocky, hard-faced man at the lefthand side of the room raised his catalogue. The auctioneer nodded. 'I have a bid of fifty thousand pounds, ladies and gentlemen.'Oriel glanced at Alan. 'You bid.'

Alan blinked, shrugged, then raised his hand. The auctioneer looked at him. 'Fifty-one thousand pounds,' Alan said.

The auctioneer smiled scornfully. "Fifty-one thousand pounds I am bid ...''Fifty-five,' said the stocky man.

'Sixty,' Alan said. Oriel was very calm. She wrote on her catalogue. Alan glanced at the words and went rigid. She had written, The Sky is the Limit. He looked at her, aghast, but her face was quite expressionless. She showed no flicker of excitement.

The bidding went on upwards. When it reached eighty thousand the crowd began to show signs of agitation. Then the stocky man shook his head and stood up, pushing his way angrily out of the room. Alan smiled triumphantly.

'Eighty thousand once, eighty thousand twice.. the auctioneer said, his hammer raised.'Ninety thousand,' said a flat Yorkshire voice.

Alan turned. The black-haired man was staring at the ceiling, but it was clearly he who had spoken. Alan was incredulous. He studied him again. Could this shabby farmer possibly pay such a price for a decaying old house?

Then he started as he heard Oriel's voice beside him. 'One hundred thousand,' she said clearly.

'A hundred and ten thousand,' the other retorted.'A hundred and twenty,' Oriel said.

The onlookers were as tense as racegoers at the Grand National. They leaned forward, eyes excited, holding their breath. Only the two main participants showed no emotion. Both were cold as ice.

The auctioneer listened, beaming. The bidding went on remorselessly while Alan's heart sank. Was Oriel mad, he wondered, to bid so steeply for this ramshackle, tumbledown old place? True, it could be restored, but that restoration would cost almost as much as the house itself if it was done properly.

The black-haired man suddenly unfolded his arms and walked out. Oriel did not turn to watch him go. She had not glanced at him once. The auctioneer waited a moment or two, then brought his hammer down. Chantries belonged to Oriel.

'A hundred and seventy thousand pounds,' Alan said breathlessly. 'A hundred and seventy thousand pounds ... are you out of your mind? My God, it was only worth the fifty thousand the seller set as the reserve. A hundred and ..

'Do be quiet, Alan,' Oriel told him coolly. "You're being boring.'

'It isn't worth it,' he said. 'Don't you understand what you've done? That farmer type could never have paid that sort of price for the house. I've no doubt he was hand in glove with your cousin Jack and they've managed to screw another hundred thousand out of you ...'

She gave him a long-lashed, unsmiling look. 'It's you who doesn't understand.'

'Look, you could have done a deal with that chap,' Alan protested.

'No one makes deals with Devil Haggard/ she said.Alan blinked. 'With who, in God's name?'

A faint smile touched her long mouth. 'His real name is Dervil. It was his mother's maiclen name. People around here have a wry sense of humour. They soon started to call him Devil...'

'But... Haggard? He's one of the family, then? Another cousin?'

She was silent a moment, looking down at her catalogue. 'Not exactly.'

'But what does that mean?' Alan was irritated.There was something odd about the whole set-up. Had Oriel and this fellow been in some sort of collusion? Why had the bidding gone on in that tense atmosphere? Everyone in the room had seemed aware of some situation of which he was totally ignorant. 'Who the hell is this Devil Haggard, then?''I'm the bastard,' said a voice he recognised.He spun, embarrassed, his face reddening.

Behind him stood the black-haired farmer, his hands on his hips, his stance mockingly aggressive. The man's blue eyes

flashed at him. He was startled to see how deep a blue they were, smudged in by thick dark lashes.

Alan coughed nervously. 'Er... I'm Alan Kennet, Mrs Mellstock's financial adviser.' He held out a well-manicured hand.

It was ignored. Devil Haggard looked him up and down. 'As a financial adviser you're a dead loss,' he said crisply. 'She paid three times the price the house is worth.'

Alan was dumbfounded. He looked at Oriel. She turned on her heel, ignoring the other man, and walked out. Devil Haggard laughed harshly.

Alan scurried after Oriel. He found her in the garden, walking through an untidy rose arbour. The last roses of the summer were browning against the broken trellises. Heaps of dry rose petals lay along the paths. There was a wild, unkempt beauty about the place, rather like the decaying beauty of the house itself.

'"Bastard", he said,' Alan breathed roughly. 'Whose?'Oriel fingered a white rose in full glorious bloom. The

petals dropped through her fingers.'Uncle Jeremiah's,' she said.

'Good lord,' said Alan, thunderstruck. 'I suppose as there was no will he didn't inherit anything?'

'They hated each other,' she said. 'Devil detested Uncle Jeremiah because he had never recognised him. Uncle Jeremiah hated to be reminded of Devil's existence. Even if there had been a will, Devil wouldn't have-got a penny.'"But he bears his name?'

'He chooses to call himself a Haggard. I think he was actually given his mother's maiden name at birth. His real name

is James Dervil. He dropped the James, made Dervil his first name and added Haggard, when he was ten years old and first heard the truth about his parentage. He used to come here and stare at the house, and Uncle Jeremiah used to send the servants to chase him away.'

'Poor kid,' Alan said, frowning. 'I can understand why he wanted the house.' He glanced at her uncertainly. 'In a way it would have been a rough sort of justice if he had managed to buy it.'

'He shall never have it so long as I can prevent it,' she said in sudden fierceness.

Alan was taken aback. There was more here than met the eye. 'I see,' he said.

She laughed, then. 'You don't see anything, poor Alan. Never mind.' She turned and looked at the house, following the rambling skyline possessively. 'Chantries is mine now, and after me, it will be my son's house.'

Alan grinned. 'Anatole will have so many houses. I doubt if this one will mean much.' He gave her a sly look. 'If you marry again and have other children you can leave it to them. You're buying it out of your personal fortune, not out of the Mellstock Trust money, aren't you? Because as one of the trustees I couldn't authorise spending so much money on a house which isn't worth the price paid.'

Oriel said crisply, 'I'm buying it out of my own money, yes, Alan. Thank you for the timely reminder.'

Alan was alarmed. Was she offended? Anxiously, he said, 'I didn't mean to ...'

'I know what you meant,' she said. 'Now, Alan,' her tone becoming briskly businesslike, 'I shall want the best team of

builders and decorators put on this job. Obviously there's a vast amount of modernisation to be carried out. Central heating, double glazing, repairs to the structure, redecorating ... there are a hundred things to do. I'll leave all that to you to organise, but when you've decided which firms to use I want a round table conference. I must know precisely what they all intend to do. I want the most detailed information all the way along the line. The decorations, in particular, must be done very carefully. I want to restore the house to its former glory, not to destroy it.'

Alan nodded. 'I'll get on to it right away. Are we going back to London immediately?''You are,' she said calmly.

He looked at her in surprise. 'What about you?''I'm staying here.'

He looked at the house, horror-struck. 'Here? You can't do that. For one thing, it's not habitable. For another, it doesn't yet legally belong to you ...'

She smiled. 'I shall stay down in the village at the pub.' Her brow wrinkled. 'I seem to remember it was called the Woolpack. They take guests.'

Alan remembered the place. He had noticed it as they drove through the tiny Moorland village. The Woolpack had been a small, square stone building at the end of the village street.

"You can't stay there!' He looked at her, all sophisticated elegance in her black dress which had Paris stamped all over it. She would look at home in the Hilton or the Ritz, but here in a Yorkshire pub? 'It's hardly your scene I'

'You forget, I was born here. They all know me, and I know most of them.''After twelve years?'

'After a hundred,' she said with confidence. 'People around here tend to stay for life. They're born here and they die here. They farm, mostly— little hill farms with a few sheep. I've sailed paper boats down the beck with most of the young men around here ... I've climbed the drystone dykes and set up dams across the becks ...'

Alan shrugged. 'I suppose I can't stop you, but I don't like it, and I don't think Renée will, either. What about Anatole?'

'Renée will look after him. He starts at his new school in September. He's going to his father's public school as Egon always planned. Anatole wants to go there—he and Egon talked about it. Anatole will be all right.''How long are you going to stay?'

She shrugged. 'I shall see. There are things I must do.'"What sort of things? Any way I can help?''No, these are private things,' she said flatly.

Alan hesitated. He had a secret dream of persuading her to marry him one day. He had been half in love with her from the first meeting, but since Egon's death he had had hopes which he believed, innocently, she did not know about. Serious-minded, kindly, Alan was far too chivalrous to hurry matters, but Egon had been dead for two years now, and he was beginning to think it was time he let her know how he felt.

'You'll... be careful, won't you?' he said gently.She looked at him out of her clear green eyes. An amused,

affectionate expression shone in them. 'I will,' she promised.They walked round to the front of the house again. Most of

the cars had gone and only a few people remained. Among them Alan saw Devil Haggard. He was standing staring up at the house with a black frown on his handsome face. Alan

watched him curiously. He was a very striking man. A long, Roman nose, firm mouth and strong jaw gave his features a look of arrogant power which matched the physical power of his body.'Does he farm around here?' he asked Oriel.

She was watching the man herself, her face shadowed by that hat once more. Quietly she said, 'Yes, at Devil's Leap ...' She gestured up at the limestone hills. 'Away up there. A very remote, forbidding place. The farmhouse almost looks as if it was carved out of the rocks rather than having been built. His mother's people have lived there for generations. They're as rooted there as the Haggards down here at Chantries.'

'Devil's Leap,' Alan mused. 'Originally Dervil's Leap, I presume?'

She smiled. 'Right. A long time ago one of the men threw himself down from the crag after he had accidentally killed his wife. The Dervils are all violent, savage-tempered creatures.'

'What happened to his mother?' Alan nodded towards the black-haired man.

'She lives up there with him. She had no brothers, so when his grandfather died the farm passed to Devil.'

'So bastard or not, he had an inheritance?' Alan asked.A strange look passed over her face. 'Oh, he had an

inheritance,' she agreed. 'But more than lands. He inherited all the black rage of the Dervils and the deviousness of the Haggards. Over the last ten years he's bought up half a dozen little hill farms. He's now one of the biggest landowners in the district.'

'So that's why he could afford to bid for Chantries,' Alan said, thinking aloud.

'That's why,' she agreed.'And you expected him to bid when you came here? You

knew he was your chief rival for the house?''I'd made certain enquiries,' she said.

'He was the chap who made your cousin Jack the offer?''Yes. Of course, Jack wouldn't sell to him, on principle. Or

to me. But by putting the house up for auction, Jack got a good price for the house and achieved another object at the same time—he had a revenge on both of us. We never liked Jack, Devil and I. We'd never let him join in our games. So Jack deliberately set up this situation now. It was his devious Haggard way of getting his own back.'

Alan felt a strange premonition. He stared at her soberly. 'You saw a lot of Devil Haggard when you lived here as a child?'

Her eyes swivelled to his face. She hesitated, then said quietly, 'I played with all the local children. I told you, Devil used to come down here often from his farm, to stare at the house. Of course I was curious about this funny little boy. I got to know him. I had to keep it secret or Jeremiah would have forbidden me to play with him, but I wasn't born a Haggard for nothing. I can be as devious as the next Haggard.'

Devil Haggard had swung himself into the saddle. The great black stallion fidgeted impatiently, and Devil walked him forward until he was level with Alan and Oriel. He looked down at her, sitting easily in the saddle, the reins loose on the black neck.

'You've paid a high price for it,' he said calmly.'But don't imagine it ends there. You've only begun to pay.'

Oriel remained calm, never showing by a movement or a glance that she had heard. Devil Haggard ignored Alan, watching the woman intently, then he laughed harshly, showing hard white teeth, wheeled his stallion and galloped away.

CHAPTER TWO

THE WOOLPACK was a cosy little place, built of the local stone, its back firmly placed towards the moors from which a powerful wind blew, winter and summer alike, bending the local trees in the same direction so that they looked like old bent men. When Alan and Oriel entered the tiny private bar there was no one to be seen, but Oriel unhesitatingly went up to the polished bar counter and struck her palm firmly over a small bell. A moment later a wizened little man emerged from somewhere at the back and came up to the counter, staring at her.'My word, is it you, Miss Oriel?''It is, Hezekiah,' she said calmly.

'You weren't at t'funeral,' he reproached. "We give him a grand send-off. All t'folk turned out.'

'I was in Africa,' she said. 'The telegram reached me too late. I would have come had I known.'

'Aye, I said you would. I thought that was how t'was.' He looked sharply at Alan.

'This is a business friend of mine,' she explained. 'Alan, this is Hezekiah Williams. He's run this pub for forty years or more.'

'Forty-three years two months,' Hezekiah corrected. 'How do, young man.'

Alan smiled. 'How do you do?'Hezekiah looked back at Oriel. 'How did auction go, then?'

'I bought Chantries,' she said.Hezekiah grinned, showing gums and two yellow teeth. 'Oh,

ye did? So that black fellow didn't get his claws on it in the end? Thank the Lord for that 1'

Oriel glanced at him from beneath her thick lashes, her green eyes very bright. 'Is there much feeling against him in the district?'

'He's a hard, grasping brute,' Hezekiah nodded. 'And clever with it, like all the Haggards. He puts me in mind of a black crow, circling overhead, waiting for a sheep to die so it can drop down and peck out its eyes. He've got half the Dale already. He bought out the Tarks and the Wheelers. He got Tor Point when old Annie Lucas passed on, and he got Lower Champneys when that damn young fool Eddie went bankrupt trying to breed cattle where cattle have never grazed before. Feeling against him, you say? Why, I think he's the most hated man in all this Riding.''What about Clare?' Oriel asked softly.

Hezekiah mumbled his lips. 'Her haven't been seen these many months. They do say she's dead already and he heven't admitted to much, but our local bobby went up there when the gossip got so bad and he said he saw her all right, but she's pretty bad. Been ill for a long weary while. Got a nurse.' He glanced at her slyly. 'Pretty little thing, that nurse. That's another thing they say. The Haggards always had an eye for a pretty girl.'

Oriel made no comment. 'Have you got a room I can take for a while, Hezekiah?'

'There's two,' he said, glancing at Alan.'I only want one,' she said.

He raised a ragged eyebrow. Oriel added drily, 'Mr Kennet is returning to London tonight.'

'Oh aye? Well, best go up and choose for yeself,' he said. 'I must see to my customers. He lifted the bar flap and let them through. 'You know way. I charge four pounds a night. I do breakfast and dinner, but nothing at midday, unless you wanted a sandwich or so, and that would be extra.'

Alan closed his eyes in horror as he saw the room. It was small and bright, facing the great open moorland, but the homely furnishings were at variance with Oriel's usual surroundings. 'You can't stay here! Look at that bed! It must have been here for donkey's years.'

It was a brass bed, the rails and knobs shining like gold, and the coverlet was of patchwork. Oriel bounced on the bed. 'A feather mattress,' she said delightedly. 'I shall sleep like an angel. I always used to sleep on feather beds as a child. It's like sleeping in a snowdrift, so comfortable and soothing ...'

'Who is Clare?' Alan demanded, his curiosity too much for him.'Devil's wife,' said Oriel. 'And my cousin.''My God, not another Haggard!'

She laughed. 'I'm afraid so—a real one this time, because her father was Jeremiah's younger brother. He died a long time ago, which is why Jack inherited, not Clare. The house went to the eldest male heir.'

'The sooner I get back to London the better,'Alan said with feeling. 'So Devil Haggard married his cousin? Did he hope to make sure of owning Chantries?'

'Yes,' she said coolly.'His plan went wrong somewhere, didn't it?*Oriel smiled icily. 'Yes.'

'From what that old man downstairs said it seems to me that you might be in some danger from that fellow,' Alan said anxiously.

She laughed. 'Devil won't hurt me. Not physically, if that's what you mean.'

Alan found her reassurance of very little comfort, but it was all he could take with him back to London. He set off shortly afterwards, taking the chauffeur-driven Rolls with him. He had offered to leave it with Oriel, but she had refused.

'I can always hire a car,' she said. 'But I mean to hire a horse as my main means of transport. Around here it can go where cars can't. Some of these roads peter out in farm tracks. There's a stable just outside the village.'

Alan eyed her doubtfully. She was such a sleek, city-bred creature. He could not imagine her climbing hill tracks on a horse. She grinned at him.

'I'm a very good rider,' she pointed out. 'I learned to ride over these hills when I was small. Don't worry about me, Alan. I'm at home here, even' if you're not.'

Next morning Oriel made her way to the stables which stood at the end of the village. The owner was a bow-legged woman with bright red hair and a loud voice. She hailed Oriel cheerfully, recognising her. 'Welcome back to the Dales. Glad to hear you bought in Chantries.'

'Thank you. Have you got a suitable horse I could hire by the week? I want to explore the countryside.'

'Surely. How about old Roz here? She's as quiet as a daisy and as sure-footed as a goat. You could do worse.'

Oriel walked round the bay pony, inspecting her carefully. She was a well-bred cob of some fifteen hands, with sturdy lines and a gentle expression.

'She looks fine,' Oriel nodded. She wrote a cheque and waited while-the owner saddled Roz.

'You'll be wanting to buy some horses,' said the woman confidently. 'I'll be glad to help you there. The stables at Chantries have been empty too long.'Oriel smiled. 'I'll let you know.'

She rode out of the yard and turned the mare off the road up a winding hillside track running beside a reed-bordered beck. They picked their way slowly. Oriel raised her eyes to the horizon. There were black clouds massing there. Rain was in the air. The sheep had moved over to huddle in the lee of the dry- stone walls. The land was well farmed, she noted. The irrigation was in good shape, the walls kept in excellent repair, no breaches or crumbling anywhere.

A shadow passed over the green upland sweep of of the Dales, wiping out the smile with which they had greeted her that morning. These were limestone hills she climbed, their grass thin over the soil which had for centuries been strip-farmed. The green showed brightest where the becks tumbled down the hillside, over rocks and boulders, pebbles and clods of earth, finding their natural level in the green valleys below.

The air was sweet and clean. There were few houses in sight. Only when she glanced back down the valley did she see any slate roofs shining in the sunshine.

She went on climbing upward without haste, the pony solid beneath her, then, as the climb became too steep, slid down off the rounded back, and walked, leading Roz.

Devil's Leap stood below, a sharp, granulated crag carved out of the limestone centuries ago in prehistory. The farm was long and low, curving in against the hillside for shelter from the prevailing wind. No trees stood near it. It had a stark strength of outline, as though it had only itself to rely on when the elements grew hostile.

Dogs began to bark as she approached. They poured out of a newly painted outhouse, yapping and snarling. Strangers were clearly not wanted here.

Some previous resident had built a drystone wall around the garden surrounding the house. It provided sufficient shelter from the wind for the owners to grow a few flowers and vegetables in this thin soil.

Oriel tied Roz to the white-painted wooden gate, but as her hand moved on to unlatch the iron fastening, Devil Haggard came out of the house and walked towards her.

He stood on the other side of the gate staring down at her. She came up to his shoulder in her flat- heeled riding boots. He flicked his eyes over her, taking in the expensive biscuit-coloured jodhpurs, the white cashmere sweater and pure silk blue scarf tied round her throat.'This is Yorkshire, not Rotten Row,' he said ironically.'I've come to see Clare,' she told him coolly.'Well, you can't see her,' he said.Her eyes narrowed. 'Why not? I'm her cousin. I've heard she's ill. I have a right to ...'

'You've no rights here, Mrs Mellstock,' he retorted, cutting in on her.'I've heard disturbing rumours,' she said fiercely.His mouth twitched mockingly, 'Oh, aye?''They say...' She broke off, biting her lip.'They say ... what do they say?''That Clare is dying of neglect,' she flung.'Well, let them say,' he said indifferently. 'It costs me nowt and their tongues would clack whatever I did.''I demand to see my cousin!''You demand?' The blue eyes flashed. 'And who are you to demand anything on my land, Mrs Mellstock? I'm master here.' He looked her up and down insolently. 'Master of everything I survey.'She flushed, angry at herself for doing so. 'I could return with a solicitor,' she said.He laughed. 'You know that's an empty threat.' Again he studied her coolly. 'You were a towheaded, long-legged gowk of a girl. You've changed.'Their eyes clashed. She did not speak.

'I think I preferred you as you were,' he went on idly.She glared at him, at last taunted out of her icy calm. 'No

doubt you did. I was easy game for an opportunistic bastard, wasn't I, Devil?'

His brows jerked together, black and furious. He suddenly put out a hand and yanked violently at her chignon, and her blonde hair came spilling and tumbling out in a shining cloak. She gave a cry of pain at the same time.'How dare you?'

He grinned. 'Now you look more like the girl I remember,' he said casually.

She turned and remounted. He leaned on the gate, watching her with amusement.'I'll be back,' she bit out angrily.

His gaze mocked her. 'I'm sure you will,' he returned.Her Haggard temper, buried for years, rose suddenly to the

surface. Leaning down in a graceful swoop, she slashed him across the face with her crop once, hard, then turned and cantered away. She heard him coming behind her as she was climbing down the hillsides. She dared not go faster for fear Roz might slip.

When she reached the road he was a stone's throw behind her, riding his big black stallion easily. Oriel's heart was pounding, as she set Roz at the gallop down the road. Chantries lay before her. Some atavistic instinct made her aim for that, and she reached the house as Devil turned in at the drive gates. She let Roz walk through to the stables, then let herself in at the front door with the key she had been given yesterday by the auctioneer.

The empty house lay all around her, silent and brooding with the weight of centuries of family quarrels.

She galloped up the stairs to the room which had once been her own. She bolted the door and collapsed on to the bed. A smell of damp arose from the rolled mattress. The rose-splashed wallpaper hung in curling peels, showing spots of green mould. A spider ran across the ceiling to where its web blew gently in the draught from the cracked window.

She heard him shouting. 'Oriel! Where are you hiding, you damned little bitch?'

She went to the window and peeped down. He was standing on the gravel path staring up at the windows. He saw her. She shot back from the window at once, her heart beginning to thud once more. He couldn't get in, of course. He would not have a key, and surely even Devil would not dare to break into the house?

She waited, listening. Was that a stone he was throwing up at the window? Something rattled down outside. She heard the wind rustling in the creeper which covered the back of the house. A shutter clacked in the wind. What was he doing, for God's sake? Had he gone?

She gave a scream of fear as his dark figure loomed in the window. How had he got there? Climbed the drainpipe? He might have been killed falling to his death! The fool! She shrank back against the wall as he drew back his foot and kicked the rotten window-frame inwards. It broke, and glass shattered over the floor. He leapt through into the room.

'Get away from me,' she whispered hoarsely, her crop held ready to beat him away.

Two strides and he had her by the shoulders. He shook her, glaring down with clamped jaws and furious blue eyes.

'I'll teach you to horsewhip me, my lady!' he hissed, seizing her crop.

She darted sideways for the door, but he caught her. His large hand held her by the arm. He sat down on a chair, gave a twist of his strong wrist and forced her down over his knees. Realising his intention, she began to swear at him savagely, threatening him.

'Damn you, Devil, don't you dare... I'll kill you ... you wicked-tempered swine, I swear I'll kill you ... oh .. .-oh...!'

The crop rose and fell five times, hard. Then he pushed her off his knees suddenly. She tumbled to the floor and lay there, her loose silvery hair spilling like silk on the worn carpet, weeping silently but with rage.

Then he bent and lifted her easily, holding her close against his body. She could feel the hard strength of the muscles which had just beaten her.His blue eyes moved over her.

'You must have forgotten while you were away that I always take my revenge,' he said calmly.She drew in a shaky breath. 'All right, you've taken it. Now get out of my house—bastard.'Their eyes fought as she said the final word, uttering the one insult which had always had power to drive him mad.He slowly, deliberately, wound his fingers into her long hair and then suddenly yanked her head back so that she could only glare at him impotently.'We played wild games as brats,' he said in a deep, bitter voice, 'but none as savage as you've played with me since. This is the last warning I shall give you. Never call me by that name again..'What name? Bastard?' She said the word with enjoyment.His face was black with rage. 'You deserve to be flung off Devil's Leap for that. Did you like being beaten so well, Oriel? Is that it? Did your rich husband neglect you so that you come back here in search of more exciting pastimes than counting your money in your London penthouse?'She struggled to get away, her pride wounded by his insinuations. 'Let me go and get out of here ...''Not just yet,' he said softly. 'There's one more thing...'

She raised her head in challenge. 'What?''This,' he said, pulling her viciously towards him, his fingers tight in her hair.She gave a moan of pain, then was silenced as his hard mouth descended in possession.They stood for a long moment, their bodies locked in taut struggle, her head jerked back by his hand in her hair, his other hand hard against her back, pressing her closer.

Then the smothering, passionate silence broke as she pulled away from him, scrubbing her hand in wild repudiation against her mouth.

'Get out, get out of here now She reeled against the wall, white-faced and shaking. 'God, I feel sick!'

He watched her, his large body motionless yet giving her the impression even, now of intense, if controlled, violence.

'Uncle Jeremiah was wise to keep you off Haggard land, you ruthless, scheming devil. He knew why you married Clare. Just to get your hands on Chantries, wasn't it, and once you realised you'd done it all for nothing you neglected her and drove her out of her mind. What plan have you cooked up now, Devil? Have you got some other heiress in view? Or are you too busy seducing your wife's nurse?'

He listened coolly, hands on his hips. 'You seem to have picked up all the local gossip. Congratulations.' His white teeth shone in a snarl. 'I'm surprised they don't suspect me of wanting to kill Linnet, too.'

'Linnet?' She stared. 'Not another woman in your life?''My daughter,' he said drily. 'She's five years old.''I didn't know ... Oh, but I must see her! Clare's child!'

'My child,' he said flatly. 'I don't intend anyone but myself to have a hand in bringing her up, thank you.'

'Of course you're the best person to have charge of a child, aren't you?'

Her mockery left him unmoved now. He moved to the door and unbolted it. Glancing back at her, he said with a gleam of malice, 'A pity to waste the opportunity of having you alone in a bedroom in an empty house, but I have more important things to do at the moment. Another time, Oriel.'

She threw a china dog at him. It smashed against the wall as he ducked.

'Your aim has deteriorated,' he said cheerfully. 'You used to be able to hit me six times out of ten in the old days. Never mind, you can get in plenty of practise now you're back."

'You're mistaking me for one of your inexperienced village girls,' she snapped.

'They have one great advantage,' he said. 'They're young. You're twenty-nine, Oriel. Oh, you don't look it, I'll grant you that. Your money has kept you very young. Good diet, good grooming, clever makeup and clothes ... but you have lines around your mouth and eyes which no skin cream can erase, and your complexion has lost that fine clear bloom it had at seventeen.'

She stared at him. The cruel words were so bitterly true.His hard mouth smiled at her. 'What? Lost for words?

There's another china dog on the mantelpiece behind you.''Get out,' she said.

'Welcome back to the Dales,' he returned smoothly. 'I'm going to enjoy the next few months. I always like a reckoning.'

She heard him walk down the stairs. They creaked protestingly as he passed, then the front door banged shut behind him. In the distance she heard his hoof- beats fading down the drive.

She covered her face with her hands. Tears trickled down her cheeks and splashed against her palms.

At seventeen she had been wild, independent and passionate; a true Haggard, wilful as a moorland pony and stubborn as a mule. Her childhood friendship with Devil had suddenly changed one fine spring morning. They had been rambling over the moors together when she had slipped on a mossy stone. He came running back for her and raised her in his arms. She had smiled at him, her hair loose around her face.

Devil's face had altered oddly. They had stared at each other in silence, then he kissed her with fierce eagerness, and she had responded, knowing with a leap of the mind that she loved him.

They dared not betray their secret. Jeremiah would never have permitted them to go on seeing each other.

Only Clare had known, and Clare had come one day to her cousin, in a flood of tears, and told her that Devil had seduced her in the hayfield the night before.

'He's been after me for weeks, but I didn't dare tell you, Oriel—I know how you feel about him. You know he frightens me, he always has. But he's so strong... I couldn't fight him... what shall I do?'

Incredulous and distraught, Oriel had ridden over to Devil's Mount to see him and accuse him of it. He had been absent, away at market, his mother had told her.

She had gone up to Devil's room to leave him a note, and there, on his cluttered desk, she had found damning evidence; a letter in his unmistakable black handwriting, beginning, 'Clare,

after last night I think you will agree that things must change between us...'

She had read it with tears running down her cheeks. It was obvious that Clare had been telling the truth.

She left no note, only walked out of the house in a state of shock and went back to Chantries. Her father was in England on leave at that moment. She asked him to take her back to Africa with him. He had agreed, after some persuasion, and they had left at once for London so that she could buy some suitable clothes. A week later she was on her way by air to Africa.

Six months later she heard from Uncle Jeremiah of Clare's marriage to Devil. Egon proposed to her some months later. She had met him soon after her arrival. He had been very kind to her, but in normal circumstances she would never have accepted him. Her pain because of Devil, coupled with some anxiety about her father's financial problems, made her think twice where otherwise she might have refused Egon immediately. It was her father who finally made up her mind. He confided to her that he was in deep water, and had been able to survive because of wide speculation that she was about to marry Egon. 'Everyone is expecting it,' he said. 'I'm afraid if you refuse him I shall have to sell up here. I'm nearly bankrupt.'

She had married Egon within the month, and their marriage had been a happy one. Oriel had determined to make it work, and her determination had paid off.

Uncle Jeremiah had written to her, sending a wedding present. Everyone back home, he said, had heard of her marriage with great pleasure. Her father had confided in him months ago, and he had been expecting the engagement to be announced. He did not mention Clare. Since the wedding he

had apparently ignored her and her husband. Any hopes Devil had had of softening his father's heart had been in vain. The marriage had merely angered the old man.

Oriel had settled down with Egon. It had been difficult at first to cope with the luxury of their surroundings, the importance of Egon's every move and the physical aspect of their marriage. But she had coped somehow, and after Anatole's birth everything had been plain sailing. She might have done anything and Egon would have accepted it. He was so grateful for the gift of a son that he showered her with presents. From the day of Anatole's arrival, Oriel had been full mistress of Egon's household, and she had made great alterations in his life style.

She settled at their Hampshire home with his mother and Anatole, and made a real home for the family. Although she had never been in love with Egon, she had grown to love him dearly, because he was a kind, warm, generous human being with a gift for understanding which might easily have been lacking in so powerful a man.

By the time he died their marriage had become a sound basis for living. She missed him even now. They had shared many tastes. Together they had listened to opera, both preferring Mozart to more emotional music like Wagner; they had read together and discussed their reading, they had enjoyed golf and riding in leisure hours.

Her feelings towards Devil had been forced underground over the years, but when she heard that Chantries was on the market after her uncle's death, she had determined to buy the house, certain that if she did not, Devil would at last possess it.

She dried her face with the back of her hand, sniffing like a child and stood up.

As she locked the front door she remembered Devil's bruising kiss. Her lips still felt numb from the force of it. Hatred filled her. He would pay for that insult one day, whatever it cost her personally. How dared he manhandle her in that savage fashion? The beating he had given her faded into insignificance beside the kiss. She had, after all, whipped him across the face. No doubt he would bear the scar of that for a while. Her rough sense of justice, drummed into her by her childhood in these hard-living Dales, made her see that Devil had had the right to pursue her and take his own back.But the kiss had been extra to that vengeance. He had taken that kiss for his own pleasure, not out of right, and she burned for her revenge.

'I shall have it, too,' she promised herself, setting off along the drive on Roz's roly-poly back. She lifted her eyes to Devil's Leap, the rugged crag marking the spot where the old farmhouse stood. 'I'll show you, my lad!' she muttered aloud.

CHAPTER THREE

THE weeks that followed were crowded with activity. Oriel spent one whole day in conference with the various builders, decorators and architects whom Alan had selected from the local choice. They had come prepared with folders of designs. She looked these over, discussed them at length, surprising the men by her acumen and knowledge- ability, then finally chose the ones she preferred and would not be moved by any further argument.

Her manner impressed them. They had been consumed with curiosity about her. After all, she was famous: the wealthy Mrs Mellstock, widow of an international financier, who since her husband's death had controlled the enormous Mellstock fortune and all the companies which underlay that fortune. They had seen photographs of her in the newspapers and they had all known what to expect. Yet when she entered the room, slender and beautiful in a cream jersey dress, her slanting green eyes filled with a mysterious, sunny smile, they had been staggered by her. No photograph could do justice to her.

As she talked to them, making shrewd, perceptive remarks about the designs, they remembered the gossip they had read about her, all the speculation as to romance; would she marry Lord This or Sir That, or would she elope with film star The Other? They had heard all about her escorts; the rich, the famous, the handsome young men who squired her around. It was all so far removed from their own world, a fairy tale with a beautiful princess for a heroine.

Now they met her and found her to be a levelheaded, coolly courteous young woman with a mind of her own who said what she thought with total frankness and knew exactly what she wanted.

On closer inspection some of them realised that the simple little brooch pinned below her neckline was exquisitely worked platinum set with emeralds; that her black stilettos were hand-made, probably in Italy, the shoe capital of the world, that her cream jersey dress, demure though it looked, was made in Paris and probably cost more than most women spend on clothes in a year.

They were excited by the project they were embarking upon. Chantries was famous beyond the Dale in which it stood. The idea of bringing it back to life was intriguing, especially since the owner showed no sign of quibbling about the price of materials, except that she began by saying that she was prepared to pay the market prices for anything. What this enigmatic sentence meant they later discovered when her accountant, Mr Kennet, produced a list of current prices for various materials, showing them that they need not try to cheat her on that par-ticular front. From that moment they were aware that they were dealing not with a woman but with the great Mellstock institution.

The architects and builders moved into the house first. Lorries thundered through the village, peaceful little Torby, bringing vociferous complaints from the inhabitants. Being Yorkshire people they came directly to Oriel with them, speaking their minds with forthright frankness.

'It's downright dangerous, Mrs Mellstock. One of these days a kiddy will be knocked down by them things.' Ena Stevens set her jaw, her pale blue fishlike eyes aggressive. Her handbag clutched to her middle, she stared at Oriel. 'We can't 'ave that.'

The others nodded. Oriel listened gravely and nodded back. 'I do see your problem. Can you see mine? These lorries must get to Chantries. You want to see the house looking beautiful again, don't you? It belongs to you as much as to me. It's our heritage, the loveliest house of the period in all Yorkshire, in my opinion.'

Tod Barmarsh cleared his throat. 'Aye, it is that. But houses are houses and lives are lives. No house is worth a child's life.'

'What about t'Caxley road?' asked Charlie Bennett abruptly. 'Couldn't lorries use that?'

Oriel glanced at him, smiling. 'Now that is a sensible suggestion I Of course they could. Why didn't I think of that?'

The others looked relieved. They had not relished a long wrangle with someone as important as Oriel Mellstock. 'Aye,' they all said, 'Caxley road, that's the answer ...'

And so the lorries disappeared from the village, which returned to its immemorial peace, only the barking of the dogs disturbing the afternoon.

'Typical British compromise,' Oriel told Alan later, her face amused. 'They're very reasonable people.'

'Cost-wise it's an expensive compromise,' he said soberly. 'This other road puts a quarter of a mile on the journey. Each lorry makes the journey four times a day. That's ...' He began the calculations necessary on his little pocket calculator.

'Alan, Alan I' she laughed, putting a hand over his. 'Stop right there, my dear foolish man. Don't you see? You understand when I buy the most expensive brick for Chantries because that's a sensible extravagance. Just so, it's pure common sense not to upset my neighbours. I see their point of view, and I've found a way to satisfy them. What it costs doesn't matter.'

Alan gazed at her incredulously. 'Doesn't matter? Doesn't matter? Oriel...'

She laughed again at his horror. "Just put it on the bill,' she said lightly. Til pay it.'

That weekend she drove back to town with Alan to see her son. Anatole and his grandmother were living in a London

penthouse flat in Mayfair. Anatole greeted Oriel at the lift, his face beaming.'Hallo, Ma.'

'Ma indeed I' She kissed him on his nose. He was at the age when any more demonstrative greeting was totally out of the question. He squirmed as he ducked away, embarrassed but delighted to see her.

She thought again how like his father he became day by day; the very way he walked reminded her of Egon.

'What's your house like?' he asked eagerly. 'When can I come down to see it?'

'Whenever you like,' she assured him. She did not want him to resent Chantries. 'It isn't ready to live in yet, you know, dear. It's being modernised.'

His grandmother was waiting for her in the little sitting-room. She always showed this tact in allowing mother and son to have the first moments alone after a separation. It was part of the reason for Oriel loving her so much.

Now she bent to kiss Renée's cheek. Egon's parents had been Swiss in origin, French-speaking Swiss who had emigrated to South Africa in the early part of the century and made their fortune in the diamond fields there. After his father's death, Egon had moved into other fields, building on the firm basis his father had laid down, until now the Mellstock business towered like a skyscraper in the business world.

Renée was eighty years old; a tiny, bird-like woman with blue-rinsed hair and pale blue eyes. Her face was a network of wrinkles. Her hands were gnarled and contorted with rheumatism, the skin stretched over them like parchment through which her blue veins showed prominently.

She was dressed in black, as always, with a triple string of pearls around her withered throat. Her husband had given them to her just before his death. She wore no other jewels except the broad gold band he had placed upon her hand at their wedding and the huge diamond ring he had given her when they began to realise that they had made their fortune.She had given all her other jewellery to Oriel at Anatole's birth. When Oriel protested in astonishment, Renée had said with tears in her eyes, 'What I give you now is nothing to what you have given me ... my grandson, of whom I had despaired ..

Egon had believed; before Anatole's birth, that he was sterile, quite unable to have children. Several of his wives had accused him of it, and he came to believe it. A doctor told Oriel, after she became pregnant, that it was more than probable that Egon's urgent desire to have a child had been counterproductive and made the chance of conception unlikely. 'The mind is a strange instrument. We don't yet understand it. But I have known these cases before. The more desperate we are to do something the more difficult does it become.'

Once convinced that Anatole was his child, Egon had hoped to have others, but they had not arrived. Oriel had hoped year after year, too, longing for at least one other child, a daughter so that Egon could have the delight of seeing his daughter grow up and " showering her with gifts. She knew that Egon, too, longed for a daughter. He was a man born to be a father. He adored his son, but he would have worshipped a girl.

Her doctor had told her that Egon was probably infertile. 'You were lucky to have Anatole.'

-Now Renée, patting her cheek, said simply, 'I'm glad to have you back, my dearest girl. We've missed you.'

Oriel was immediately struck with remorse. 'Why didn't you tell me you needed me? I would have come at once.'

'You were having fun—we saw that from your letters. You haven't had a holiday alone for years. We wanted you to be happy.'

Looking at her mother-in-law Oriel was filled with self-reproach. Renée was too old to be saddled with responsibilities like an eleven-year-old boy.

'Is Anatole too much for you? Do you find it tiring to manage him?'

'Silly girl, of course not. He's the joy of my life. I have Mrs Weedon and Iris to do all the work. Whenever I'm tired, they look after Anatole. You know very well that they nag me if they think I've done too much.'

Mrs Weedon and her daughter Iris ran the flat, doing all the housework and cooking. They had worked for them for some years and were more like family friends than employees, particularly in the way they nagged Renée if she did too much.

Renée sighed. 'The only thing that worries me is that Anatole will soon be at school again. I shall miss him.'

'Egon wanted him to go to this school, remember. It's the school Egon's father chose for him. Egon put Anatole's name down as soon as I knew I was pregnant.' Oriel smiled, remembering that day. How Egon had danced with joy as he sealed that letter 1 He had been transfigured with delight.

Renée sighed. 'I know, I know. The boy must go away to school. But I shall be lonely without him.'

'Then ..Oriel hesitated. 'Then would you consider coming to live at Chantries with me? I know you love to be here in London or I would have asked you before. Chantries is a lonely

little place. You won't have the same pleasures there as you do here, but you might find it a pleasant change to live in a new place for a while.'

Renée looked at her gravely. 'My dear, you bought this house because our London life bores you, and I'm afraid country life bores me. It was different in Hampshire. When Egon was alive ...' She sighed. 'Well, I prefer city life. You know that.'

Oriel nodded. 'Then I'll stay in London, Renée...''No,' Renée told her firmly. 'I want no sacrifices ..'It wouldn't be a sacrifice! I love you dearly I And Chantries

isn't habitable yet, nor will it be for months. I shall be happy to stay in London.''We shall see,' Renée said.

Oriel remained in London, taking Anatole to the Zoo and to Madame Tussaud's, seeing films with him, visiting the theatre, the opera and the ballet. Her days were filled with activity. She helped him to buy his school uniform. Renée wept as she saw him in it for the first time; he looked so like his father. Anatole shifted uneasily. He wished his grandmother would not be so emotional, but then she was still un- English, retaining her continental ability to show her feelings in a way this English schoolboy found alarming. Although Anatole loved his grandmother and his mother, he was looking forward eagerly to his new school. It would be fun to be back among men again. Anatole found himself too woman- ridden since his father's death. During Egon's lifetime the boy had been his constant companion, and Anatole missed that easy comradeship.

In September Anatole started school. He could not refuse to be driven there by his mother's chauffeur, Mr Weedon, in the

silver-blue Rolls which had belonged to his father, nor could all his persuasion move Oriel and Renée from accompanying him.

'All the boys will come with their parents,' Renée insisted.'But you won't kiss me, Grand'mere? Or cry?' Anatole

looked mulishly at them.Oriel laughed. 'Horrid boy I We'll do neither, we promise.

We shall be very English, wearing our best stiff upper lips I'He grinned. In his stiff new clothes and cap he looked

suddenly much more grown-up and at the same time more of a child. Oriel knew that he was about to launch himself into a new world where she could not follow him, and her heart moved painfully within her.

They met the headmaster, then Anatole's new housemaster and his sturdy wife, were shown the room in which Anatole would sleep and took tea with the housemaster's wife among a crowd of other parents, then Anatole walked to the car with them, his manner kindly and aloof. They refrained from kissing him by an enormous effort, shook hands and smiled.

As they drove away through the rolling green park which surrounded the school Oriel found herself crying. Renée sat very still, her gnarled hands shaking on her lap.'We've lost him,' Renée said quietly.

They were quiet for a long time, then Renée took out a folder of brochures. 'My dear, I have decided to take a long cruise to find the sun. English winters are too long and too cold. I shall shut up the flat and take Mrs Weedon and Iris with me. I shall need them to help me and they deserve a holiday.'

'That's an excellent idea,' Oriel agreed. 'Would you like me to come, too?'

Renée shook her head. 'No, my dear. I shall do very well without you. You've devoted the last two sad years to Anatole and myself. Now you shall have time for yourself. Go back to your cold Yorkshire moors and put your house in order. If you need me, send for me at once, but otherwise I shall follow the sun in luxury and see more of the world.'

A week later she saw Renée and the two servants off at Southampton. They were sailing to the West Indies at first, but Renée had ideas of venturing further afield, perhaps visiting the West coast of America or the East, later.

Renée was quite excited, her thin face flushed, as she kissed Oriel goodbye. Mrs Weedon and Iris were tense with happiness. They had never been out of England before, and they could not wait for the ship to sail.

When Oriel had waved from the quayside she returned to the Rolls. Mr Weedon had been left behind. He was rather animated, for once, since he had been looking forward to a bachelor existence for the past week.

'I shan't need you,' Oriel told him. 'Report to Mr Kennet. He'll be paying your wages, as usual, but I think you deserve a holiday, too. Take a month, if you wish. Mr Kennet will keep you in touch with what's happening. When he needs you, he'll let you know. You can work for the company while Mrs Mellstock is away.'He nodded. 'What about the Rolls, madam?'

'I'll take that,' she said, imagining the reaction in Torby when she arrived back in it.

She handled the Rolls with respect, taking her time over the long drive north, along a windy motorway busy with industrial traffic. As always, the sleek machine received admiring glances,

which turned into wolf-whistles from lorry drivers when they noticed the driver. Although she did not hurry, the car ate up the miles, purring smoothly along.

Just outside Torby she passed a pretty girl pushing a bicycle which had obviously suffered a puncture. Oriel braked and put her head out of the window.'Going far? Can I give you a lift?'

The girl stared in astonishment at the long, shimmering car. 'I'm bound for Devil's Leap Farm,' she said.

Oriel's lashes flickered. This must be the nurse gossip talked about.

'We can put your bicycle in the boot,' she told her, getting out and going round to open it. The girl nervously stowed her bicycle as instructed and climbed into the passenger seat beside Oriel. The car moved softly away.'This is a Rolls-Royce, isn't it?' the girl asked in awe.'Yes,' Oriel smiled.'I've never ridden in one before,' the girl told her. She put her hand to the leather seat, stroked it lovingly. 'It's beautiful, isn't it?''A work of art,' Oriel agreed.The girl sucked in a breath suddenly. 'Eh, are you Mrs Mellstock that bought Chantries?'Oriel nodded. 'Yes, I am. Who are you, Miss ...?'The girl stared at her sidelong, taking in her grey suit, an exclusive design from Paris, with the delicate hand-made jade-green shoes and handbag which were the accessories.'I'm Jessica Morby. I'm nursing Mrs Haggard.' The few words were pregnant with unspoken comment. This girl clearly knew

a great deal about the situation between Devil's Leap and Chantries.'How is Mrs Haggard?' Oriel asked quietly.'Very ill.''Is she going to... get better?'Jessica shrugged. 'I couldn't say. You would have to ask the doctor that. Nurses aren't allowed to make prognostications.''They may not be allowed to make them, but I imagine they have a pretty shrewd idea of what they are,' said Oriel.'That's more than my job is worth,' the girl retorted. Her manner had become faintly hostile since she realised who Oriel was, and her glances were cold.'I'm Mrs Haggard's cousin,' Oriel pointed out.'If I said anything to you, it might get back to Dr. Warne, and he'd tear a strip off me for opening my mouth,' the girl said irritably.

Oriel slowed down as they neared the foot of Devil's Leap. 'This is as far as I can take you in the car,' she said politely.

The girl got out, walked round and waited while Oriel unlocked the boot. Removing her bicycle, the girl nodded curtly, 'Thanks for the lift.' She turned away without further words. Oriel got back into the car and watched her climb the hillside for a while. Then she drove on to Chantries, wondering how she was going to find out the truth about her cousin. She could not let Clare die without making the attempt to see her and end their old quarrel. The rift between them had not been of her making. Devil had brought it about through his ambition and his desire to own Chantries. Clare was an innocent bystander who had been caught up in a war.

She found the work at Chantries proceeding very nicely. After she had seen the foreman and congratulated him, she took a stroll around the park, noting the depredations caused by time and neglect here, too. The timber had been allowed to decay. Old trees lay on the ground, rotting. One had been split by lightning and stood in riven melancholy, the torn ' trunk festooned with ivy and the pale brown frills of fungus.

Approaching the far side of the park Oriel suddenly remembered the old lodge cottage once occupied by a lodge-keeper and his family. It still stood there, the windows broken, the house empty and desolate.

Oriel stared at it thoughtfully. She broke a few jagged pieces of glass in the kitchen window and clambered through carefully into the cottage. It still held a few sticks of abandoned furniture. There were cobwebs everywhere and an odour of damp and dust. But it could be made habitable enough for her to spend a few weeks here until Chantries was ready for occupation.

She drove down to the village and spoke to Ena Stevens, whose husband drove the local milk float. Mrs Stevens listened with a grim expression.

'Aye, I could find you someone to clean up t'old lodge. I'll do it meself, in fact. You'll be wanting cleaners at Chantries, no doubt, when you move in, and I was meaning to apply for t'job.'

Oriel studied her. 'That would be marvellous. When could you start?'

'No time like t'present.' She rolled up her sleeves and squared her jaw. 'Now, about wages ...'

They came to an amicable, hard-fought arrangement. Oriel knew perfectly well that she was lucky. She only had to look

around Ena's home to see what a good housewife she was; the place shone with cleanliness.

Ena hesitated as she showed Oriel to the door. 'About t'Lodge,' she murmured. 'When you move into Chantries what was you meaning to do with that?'Oriel blinked. 'I had no plans for it, actually.' She glanced at Ena. 'Why?''You weren't going to need it for your chauffeur or anything?''There's plenty of space for servants at Chantries itself,' Oriel said. 'I'm having a flat built over the garage. The chauffeur and his wife will live there.'Ena bit her lip. 'It's me brother. He wants to get married, but he has no money…'Where does he work?''He's driving coal lorries.'Oriel nodded. 'Ask him to come and see me.'Ena's shoulders relaxed. 'Aye, I will,' she said. Being Yorkshire-born she made no fulsome offer of thanks, but her smile said a great deal.Driving her back to Chantries, Oriel realised that although she remembered many of the local people as children, she had yet to discover them again as adults. They had led such different lives to hers. Their worlds had been planets apart.She dropped Ena and her working equipment at the Lodge and returned to the village to get lunch. Hezekiah had gone to some trouble to lay a meal on for her, and he looked grimly pleased as she thanked him.'No trouble,' he said. 'We're grateful you took them lorries round t'back of t'village.'

'It was a pleasure to put things right,' Oriel said gravely. 'If ever you're concerned about anything, you only have to speak to me. I would hate to offend the village.' She finished the braised oxtail he had brought her and asked him, 'Do you know where I can find Dr Warne?'

Hezekiah glanced at her shrewdly. 'Want to ask him about your cousin, do ye? He lives in the old Rectory down by the church. They sold the Rectory when they made us double up with St Bride's over at Colwheel. We have a curate come over every Sunday, but otherwise the church is empty most times.''How sad,' she said.

'Aye, well, times change. It's all economy, now. They say the Church can't afford to keep a Vicar here full-time any more.'

Oriel walked down the road to the old Rectory that afternoon. The autumn sun shone with mellow kindness on the square Victorian building, gilding the burnished creeper which clung to the red brick.

A harassed young woman opened the door and stared at her. 'Yes?' Her brown eyes flitted over Oriel's grey suit admiringly. 'Can I help you?'

'Is Doctor Warne free? I would like to speak to him.''Professionally? He's just finishing his lunch ...' The brown

eyes showed impatience. 'The surgery hours are...''No, not professionally,' Oriel said gently. 'Are you Mrs

Warne?''Yes,' the other woman said slowly.'I'm Mrs Mellstock,' Oriel said.

'Oh ...' Mrs Warne looked astonished. She swallowed, then held out her hand. 'How do you do?'

Oriel smiled and shook hands. 'I'm sorry to bother your husband at this time, but...'

'Oh, no, please, do come in ...' Mrs Warne held the door open and stood back welcomingly.

A large red toy car stood in the little hall. A rag doll with long yellow hair flopped engagingly in a corner by the stairs. Mrs Warne looked at them, flushing.

'My children, I'm afraid. They make the house so untidy...''I know,' said Oriel. 'I have a son. He's eleven now and away

at school, but I've been through the toy car stage and I remember it all too vividly.'

Mrs Warne laughed. 'You must miss him, Mrs Mellstock...''Please, call me Oriel,' she replied.

'Oriel... what a lovely name. It's unusual. Mine is Joan, rather more mundane, I'm afraid.'

'I often used to wish my name was more ordinary, Joan,' Oriel said. 'Children can be cruel if one is in any way different.'

'How true,' Joan agreed. 'I think children are far more primitive than people realise. Monsters, really, at times.'

She ushered her into a sunny sitting-room at the back of the house. 'Would you mind waiting here for a moment? I'll get my husband.'

She returned in a little while with a tall, brown- haired young man with a curling beard who smiled at Oriel, extending a well-shaped, capable hand. 'Well, hallo! The mystery woman of the neighbourhood. I've heard so much about you that I was beginning to believe you were a mythical creature, like the Gryphon.'Oriel laughed. 'Nothing so extraordinary, I'm afraid. How do you do, Dr Warne?'

'Do call him Philip,' Joan urged.He grinned. 'She means Phil. She only calls me Philip when she wants to impress people.'They talked about Chantries, and about the effect her arrival had had on the district. 'The most exciting news since the relief of Mafeking,' Phil insisted.'I really came to ask you about my cousin, Mrs Haggard,' Oriel told him.His face sobered. 'Ah ... yes. You're related to her, of course. Have you seen her?''Her husband refused to let me do so,' Oriel said.The Warnes glanced at each other. Mrs Warne exclaimed angrily, 'That man!''Now, Joan...' warned her husband.'He's a monster/ Joan declared angrily. 'When I think of that poor woman up there all alone.. /'But she has a nurse?' Oriel asked.Joan laughed harshly. 'What, Jessica? Oh, she is a nurse, I grant you, but she's more interested in Devil Haggard than in her patient.''For God's sake, Joan,' Phil broke in, aghast. 'Watch your tongue 1' He looked at Oriel. 'My wife has no business to pass on slander like that. She doesn't know what's going on up there. The village puts two and two together and makes it five.' He looked sternly at his wife. 'Do you want to be sued for slander?'

'Don't worry about me,' Oriel promised him carefully. 'I shall not repeat a word of this to anyone. I'm concerned about Clare, obviously. We're cousins, and although we haven't met for twelve years the relationship still remains. I want to know exactly what the position is ...'

He fingered his chin. 'If her husband refused to let you see her he might object if I told you anything.'

'Oh, Phil!' cried his wife. 'How can you be so unfeeling?''Professionally I have no business interfering in the matter,'

he said flatly.'But surely you can tell me if she's likely to recover from

this illness?'He sighed. 'Off the record, I doubt if she'll live beyond this

winter.''Oh,' Oriel said softly, her face saddening. 'Poor Clare.

What's wrong with her?''Liver,' he said, succinctly. He hesitated, looking at his wife.

'Look, why not ask her husband? I really don't think ...'' Joan broke in impatiently, 'Why not tell her? Everyone around here knows the truth.' She looked at Oriel. 'Your cousin drinks—that's the point. She's drunk herself to the point of total extinction.'

Oriel was staggered. 'Clare? Clare drinks? Good God, but surely ...'

'Joan, what am I going to do with you?' Phil sighed. 'Look, Oriel, you won't tell Haggard I told you this, will you? He'd half kill me. A violent man, your cousin's husband.'

Oriel smiled at him. 'I promise absolute discretion.''A pity other people don't do the same,' he said drily,

looking at his wife.She made a face at him. *I think Oriel has a right to know

the truth. No wonder the poor woman took to drink with that man treating her the way he does.'

'No morel' Phil moaned. 'Not another word— and that's an order.'

Oriel grinned at Joan. 'Ena Stevens is making the old Lodge into a home from home for me. When you have a spare hour or two, come up for tea. We can have a nice chat.'

'Good lord,' Phil said, horrified. 'I never heard a more blatant invitation to backbite and gossip in my life!'

The two women laughed. ‘I must go,' said Oriel. 'I think I'll visit Devil's Leap again and see what I can find out...'

CHAPTER FOUR

ON a sunny afternoon the path to Devil's Leap was alive with spiders floating on fine gossamer threads, like tiny parachutists leaping down the steep green hillsides. They blew across Oriel's face, trapping themselves in her hair. She brushed them away with one hand carefully. Moon daisies and poppies often grew along these sheltered hollows in the hill, but today there were only sprigs of rough heather and prickly gorse.

She climbed steadily, her mind on the past. How often they had come this way together and perched on Devil's Leap crag to stare down across the valley at the tiny doll-like houses of the village and the white thread of the road winding round between green fields.

They had been as wild as hill ponies, the two of them, laughing over some jokes they had played on poor Uncle Jeremiah or on one of the shepherds who drove the sheep over the high fields. Once they had sewn Hezekiah's boots together so that when he got up in the middle of the night to go out to the outhouse he tripped and fell in a puddle, yelling fit to wake the whole village. Another time they had rung the church bell at three in the morning and brought the old Vicar moaning from

his Rectory to find the bell tower empty and locked again, but the bell rope swinging mysteriously, the great bell giving forth that low resounding hum which follows when the ringing has stopped. The village talked for months about 'the church ghost'.

Many of their expeditions had taken place by night, when she was supposedly fast asleep in her bed. She would meet Devil at the park boundary and they would roam the village and the empty hillsides in search of mischief to do. Devil always had the best ideas. His was an ingenious, inventive mind.

She laughed now, remembering 'the church ghost' —they had been tempted to repeat that trick, but Devil said they might be caught and spoil the story. Best leave it. They had mystified the village, and he did not want to ruin a good tale.

After they grew up and fell in love their night wanderings had taken on a new meaning, but Oriel shied away from memories of that. They burnt like gall at the back of her throat.

She approached the house cautiously. Today no dogs burst out to bark at her, nor did Devil appear. She went up the narrow, flower-fringed path and found the front door open. She ventured slowly inside. There was no sound anywhere.

She called hesitantly, but no one answered. Then, after calling again, she at last heard a faint cry from upstairs.'Who is it?'

She recognised the voice immediately. It was Clare. She went upstairs and made for the master bedroom, but found it empty, the great bed neatly made and covered with a faded old patchwork quilt she remembered vividly from former visits.

She turned to the other front bedroom, and when she pushed open the door she found herself facing Clare.There was a long silence.

Clare was sitting in a basket-weave chair beside the window, her legs wrapped in a hand-knitted blanket of red and blue squares. She was thinner, smaller, more sallow than Oriel remembered; her hair was tied back with a blue ribbon from her face, her brown hair faded with silver already. But it was Clare's eyes that alarmed her most—they were still pale blue, yet so yellow were the whites that their colour seemed to have changed entirely.

Clare began to laugh hysterically. 'You! Good God, you! So you've come..

"Clare, my dear girl...' Oriel moved quickly towards her, distressed both by her appearance and by the high-pitched sound of her laughter.

'Sneaked in while he's out, didn't you?' Clare asked maliciously. A spot of dark red showed in each cheek. 'He'll be furious, you know that, don't you?'

'Why wouldn't he let me see you, then? You are my cousin, after all.'

'After all?' Clare seemed to consider the words seriously. 'Ah, after all... that's it, isn't it? A big word—all.'

Oriel sank down beside the chair and took Clare's small, shrivelled fingers in her own. 'How thin you are,' she said. Why did Clare sound so wild and incoherent? Was that the drink?

'Have you come back to see me die? You won't have too long to wait. That fool of a doctor won't tell me the truth, but I know what he thinks. It's in his face. I won't live to see another spring.' Self-pity clouded her expression for a moment, then she said pitifully, 'Oriel...' Then in sudden savagery, 'Why d'you look so young? You've no right to look so young when I'm dying...'

'Clare,' Oriel hushed her. 'Don't!''Did you come up the Primrose Bank? Do you remember

how we used to climb it and bring back armfuls of primroses every Easter? Such pretty flowers. They looked like drifts of golden coins under the long grass. I haven't been down to Torby for years. He wouldn't let me go.' She laughed, her expression furtive. 'Afraid I'd find a way to get some drink, he said.' She clutched at Oriel and stared at her blindly. 'I'm a prisoner here. Devil won't let me leave. Oh, they knew what they were doing when they called him that... Devil by name and Devil by nature. He's a cruel wild beast. I hate him, I hate him!'

'Clare, why do you drink?' Oriel asked gently. 'It will kill you in the end, you know.'

Clare's eyes grew secretive and turned in upon themselves. 'Why are you back in the Dales? What are you after? Is it him? Did you come back for him?' Her fingers were snatched from Oriel's grasp and she glared at her bitterly. "You and he... always you ... he wanted you and nobody else.' Then her lip was sucked in over her teeth and she was silent a moment. She looked at Oriel again, her smile full of hostile malice. 'Too late, my girl. Devil's got his eyes on someone else now—that so-called nurse of mine, Jess, the scheming little madam. Oh, I know what she wants. She got her claws into him from the first day. Watch out for Jess, Oriel. When I'm gone Devil will be free to have her.'

'I'm not interested in him,' Oriel told her flatly. 'I came to see if I could do anything for you, Clare.' She took a deep breath. 'I'm having Chantries put back into its old condition. It will be beautiful again, as it was meant to be, and then I want you to come and live there, if you will, Clare. Away from

Devil's Leap you may recover. Chantries is still your home if you want it.'

'Chantries ...' Clare's eyes clouded again. Tears squeezed out from beneath her wrinkled lids.

Oriel held her hands and Clare did not snatch them away. After a long pause she said huskily, "I can't come, Oriel. This is my home now. Wherever Devil is... oh, he hates me, I know that, but you see, I still love him. I always have, I always will. If he choked me with his own hands I would die loving him.'Oriel gave a deep sigh. 'I understand.'

Clare sat silent a while, then looked at her as if seeing her properly for the first time. 'You look so different. Your clothes reek of money. How does it feel to be rich, Oriel?' Her smile was again faintly spiteful. 'You fell on your feet, didn't you? Marrying that millionaire like that. I had no qualms about stealing Devil from you when I heard about that. You could never have loved him the way I did or nothing would have stood in your way. If Prince Charming had come along to propose to me I would have refused him for Devil..

Oriel smiled gravely. 'By the time I married Egon I knew that Devil wanted you, remember?'

Clare looked at her sidelong with a sly smile. 'Oh, yes. Of course.'

Suddenly they heard footsteps leaping up the stairs, then Devil appeared in the doorway, bare-chested, a muddy shirt in his hands. He stood still, staring at Oriel. His dark face grew stormy.'What in hell are you doing?'

'She sneaked in while you were out of the way,' Clare said with a pathetic desire to propitiate him. 'I couldn't stop her

coming in here, could I? I...''Shut up, Clare!' he barked.

'Don't speak to her like that, you brute,' Oriel snapped.His blue eyes flashed at her, the black brows drawn above

them in a bar. 'What's she been saying to you? What's been going on here?'

'She asked me to leave you,' Clare cried weakly, putting out her thin, fragile hand towards him. 'Devil, she tried to take me away from you ...'

His smile was ironic. 'How little you know of my dear wife, Oriel, to ask her to do that. Don't you know that bars of iron and cages of steel could not keep her away from me?' He looked down at Clare, his handsome face contemptuous. 'Isn't that so, Clare?'

'I love you,' she moaned. 'Don't torment me, Devil.'He glanced at Oriel. 'You see?'

Her voice was ice-cold. 'Oh, I see. But I'll find a way to punish you for all this one day, Devil Haggard. You're contemptible!'He laughed. 'Get out, Oriel.'"I'll leave when Clare asks me to,' she said.

He flung his muddy shirt across the landing and came towards her.

She shrank back. 'Lay one finger on me and I'll call the police!'

His white teeth were bared in a snarl of amusement as he grabbed her by the arm and pulled her towards the door. 'I've a perfect right to eject you from my home. You weren't invited here and have no right to refuse to leave.'

'Clare ... remember ... if you need me ... I'll help in any way I can ..Oriel called the words back as she was dragged from the room.

Devil hustled her down the stairs. In the hall he released her and she glared at him, rubbing her arm. 'You ... you barbarian!'

As she moved to pass through the front door he slammed it shut in her face and pushed her against the wall. She put up a hand to hit him, but he caught it and held it down. His blue eyes were very bright and angry.

'I told you to stay away,' he hissed below his breath.He was so close that she could feel the weight of his thighs

against her, his bare chest inches away from her. She felt her legs weaken below her and a sudden hunger invade her body. Her eyes flickered hurriedly over the brown, muscled hardness of his chest, then closed in brief rejection of the feelings he was arousing in her. He was her cousin's husband, the man who had once hurt her more than she could bear, and she would not weaken towards him.

'Why did you really come here, Oriel?' he asked her, watching her. 'To see Clare? Or to see me?'

'The last person in the world I wanted to see was you, Devil Haggard,' she said huskily. 'If you ever lay hands on me again I'll sue you for assault.'

He lazily took her by the shoulders, bending her backwards like a helpless doll. 'Like this, you mean?'

'Let me go,' she whispered, her eyes helplessly fixed on his hard mouth.

It came down towards her and her eyes closed involuntarily even as her lips parted hungrily beneath the pressure of his, giving and receiving passion.

Without her volition her hands crept up his chest, lingeringly, and curved around his neck, touching the short hair at the back of his head. Her back arched sensuously. Her married life with Egon had been gentle and sensitive, but it had never aroused her physical emotions, and now a great ocean flood of hunger seemed to sweep down upon her and carry her away. She desired Devil in a way which terrified and elated her. Her whole body tingled with the need to be possessed by him. She wanted to submit, abandon everything to this passion.

At last he drew back, released her and walked away without a word, leaving her stunned and dazed, like a creature stricken suddenly blind, leaning against the wall.

She heard a door slam somewhere at the back of the house. Devil had gone.

Oriel somehow got out of the house and made her way down the hillside, but at last, in a quietly sunny spot, she sank down on the thin grass and lay full- length, contemplating what had happened with silent horror.

How he must be laughing at her, wherever he had gone! After all she had said to him about hating him, she had crumbled like an old wall when he touched her. He could not have mistaken what had happened. She knew that he had felt it too, that slow pulsing hunger which had possessed her. Her body had betrayed her.

'Oh, Egon,' she moaned, rolling over and hiding her face, 'why did you have to die?'

The short grass smelt of sunshine and fresh winds. She lay there face down for a long time until her pulses had slowed to a quiet pace and her self-disgust had subsided enough to permit her to go on downwards.

When she got back to the Lodge cottage she met Ena, who had just finished her work. They had agreed that Ena would only make two of the rooms habitable. Ena had scrubbed the floors, swept down the walls, washed the windows and the curtains. The curtains were dry now after an afternoon blowing in the crisp wind. Ena had hung them up at the windows. They had chosen two rooms which had unbroken windows. The other rooms were much lesshabitable—the wind and rain had blown in through the broken windows and stained the wallpaper and rotted the floorboards.'I think you'll be comfortable here for a while,' Ena said. 'Have you told Hezekiah you're moving in?'Oriel smiled. 'Yes. He was relieved to be rid of me, I think. He finds it a bother to have guests.'Ena's glance travelled to her clothes. 'Eh, your skirt ... it's fair ruined 1 Whatever have you been doing in it?'Oriel looked down. It was stained with grass and earth where she had lain on the hillside. 'I slipped coming down the hill,' she lied.Ena's eyes were shrewd. 'Been up to Devil's Leap, have you?''Yes,' Oriel nodded.'How's Mrs Haggard, then? Did ye see her?''She's not at all well.''No, well she wouldn't be. That thrawn devil is enough to drive anybody half mad, and with Haggard blood in her, Clare was already halfway there to begin with ...''When did you last see her, Ena?' Oriel asked.'Years back. She hasn't been down for this long while.' Ena glanced at her. 'They say she drinks.'Oriel sighed. 'So I've heard.'

'Ah, true, is it?''I've no idea.'Ena smiled grimly. 'That's it, stick together. I always say, blood's thicker than water and we have no one to help but our own.'

Oriel nodded. 'Thanks for the work you've done. I'm very grateful.'

Ena's eyes were filled with wry amusement. 'Going to do for yourself, are ye? Cook and so on?'Oriel smiled. 'I'm going to try.'

'Make a change, I suppose.' Ena was obviously curious about her life style. 'Got servants in London, I daresay.'

'Yes. I'm not used to it, but I've got two hands and a brain like any other woman. I've no doubt I can cope perfectly well for a while.'

'Of course ye can,' Ena nodded. 'Do you good, I shouldn't wonder. There's nothing like a bit of hard work to take a body's mind off problems.'

When she had gone Oriel thought about that last remark. Had Ena any idea what problem she was struggling with? Or had that last remark been a stray shot which struck home?

She drove to Chantries next morning to see how the work was coming along, then drove to the nearest little market town to do some shopping. She bought an electric kettle, a small electric portable oven and some kitchen utensils. With these few things she would be able to survive at the lodge for some weeks.

She rang Alan that evening and told him what she had done. 'I shall live on baked beans and toast, no doubt, but it will be fun—a bit like camping out.'

'My God, you must be going mad,' Alan said anxiously. 'Oriel, please, come back to London. I miss you ...'

'Thank you, Alan,' she said gravely, 'but I have too much to do here.'

She rang off and drove back to the lodge through the whispering darkness of the park. The loneliness of her chosen residence only struck her now. She parked the car and went through into the cottage. As she switched on the light she saw something leap across the room.

She screamed, dropping her packages with a crash. It had been a rat, a large black shape which sent an atavistic shiver of horror down her spine.

The next moment she heard someone coming through the front door with a bang and a thud of running feet. Her fear intensified as she swung, white-faced, to meet this new intruder.

Devil burst into the room, a shotgun over his arm, his black hair windblown into a tangle of wild curls. He stared around the room alertly, then looked at her with raised brows.'I heard you scream. What's wrong?"

She found it hard to speak. Her lips seemed to be numb. Slowly, rustily, she whispered, 'A rat...'

He laughed, his white teeth showing in wicked amusement. 'Was that all? A rat? My God, woman, you've softened up during your years of living on the fat of the land. You should be ashamed of yourself. A Haggard scream at the sight of a rat? Where's your backbone?'

Her Haggard temper flared to meet his. 'Get out of my house, Devil I Go on, march!'

'I throw you out in the morning, you throw me out at night. Fair exchange, is that it?' His grin was

mocking. 'But would you throw me out at night, Oriel?' The blue eyes surveyed her with lazy speculation. 'Wouldn't you rather I stayed? It's lonely out here, isn't it? Cold and lonely. I could keep you warm and safe ..Her backbone was stiff enough now, she thought furiously. She would like to wipe that self-assured look off his handsome face.'First a four-legged rat, then one on two legs,' she said bitterly. 'I can do without either of you. You might leave me that shotgun—I could do with some protection from the wild animals around here.'He grinned appreciatively. 'You still carry quite a punch, Oriel. But can you still handle a gun?'She held out her hand.He sauntered over, came behind her and put his arms around her, the gun in one hand. 'Show me,' he whispered at her ear.'Stand over there and I will,' she threatened.He laughed softly. 'Why do you think I'm behind you? I don't trust that Haggard temper of yours.'He helped her to raise the gun, watched how she handled it. 'Come outside,' he said. 'You can shoot at an owl. The damn place is full of them.''I love owls,' she protested.He grinned. 'Don't you know when I'm teasing, any more?'She followed him out into the darkness. With a cool voice she asked, 'What are you doing down here at this hour, Devil? Poaching on my land?'He laughed. 'Why not?''I may shoot the next poacher I see,' she told him.He laughed again. 'I'm better than that. You'll never see me by night.'

'Well, that's a relief,' she said sarcastically.An owl flew between them and the moon. She saw the great feathered wings like a spread fan, and quick as a flash she whipped up the shotgun and aimed slightly to one side. The owl gave a cry of alarm. A solitary feather floated down in the moonlight, then it sailed on into the dark.'Not bad,' Devil said admiringly. 'But I don't think I'd better leave the gun here. You might keep your promise and shoot me next time.''There'd better be no next time,' she said, suddenly serious.He stood very still, facing her, his blue eyes steely in the moonlight. 'You've come back very beautiful, Oriel,' he said softly. 'What was your husband like?''Kind, gentle, considerate...''Poor bastard,' Devil said grimly.'What does that mean?''An old man with a lovely young wife—what else could he be but kind and considerate?''I loved Egon!'Devil laughed. 'Loved his money.''I loved him.'Devil reached out for her. She brought the gun up, pointing it at his stomach. 'Don't come any nearer, Devil!''I'd like you to shoot me, Oriel,' he said hoarsely. 'Don't you know that what's between us is so elemental that only an act of total violence could end it? Every time I see you I want to die.'

She was stunned by his words. Staring at him through the night, she felt her heart pumping away like an engine, sending the blood around her body, the pulses at wrists, throat, fingertips beating furiously.

'You married Clare,' she said suddenly, the words an accusation so intense she felt they burned the air as she spoke them.'You married your millionaire first,' he said.

'No,' she said bitterly. 'I married Egon some months later.''But you were engaged to him before I married Clare,' he

insisted. 'She showed me a letter from your father. Your father was boasting about it all...'

'Egon hadn't even proposed then,' she said. She stared at him. 'Oh, it's true that Father leapt the gun about it. He took it for granted I would marry Egon. In fact, it was because of my father that I did it in the end. Father was bankrupt, and I had to marry Egon to save him.'

There was a long silence while they stared at each other. 'You mean it wasn't true? When I married Clare you were still free?''Yes,' she said.

Devil swore viciously. 'That lying bitch! She tricked me! I would never have married her if I'd known. But I thought ... you were gone. I could never have you. What did I care who I married after that?'

Oriel remembered Clare's distress on the night she came running home saying Devil had seduced her. She looked at him with bitter scorn. 'Oh, why bother to lie to me? You were after Clare before I even left for Africa.''She was after me, you mean,' he snapped.

'For God's sake, Devil, don't say such things about Clare,' she cried in anguish. 'Haven't you hurt her enough all these years without lying about her now?'

'I'm not lying,' he said forcefully. 'I tell you, Clare wanted me then, while we were going around together, and once you'd left she moved in on me. I was miserable and lonely without you, and Clare saw her chance. When she showed me that letter about you marrying your millionaire I didn't see the point of carrying a torch for you for the rest of my life. My pride clamoured to show you I didn't care. So I married her, and I soon regretted it. She's been nothing but a misery to me and herself ever since. I did her no favour in marrying her. She knew I never loved her and it ate into her like acid.'

'How can you say such wicked things about her? Clare loves you. She has little cause, God knows, but one thing I do know ... it was you, Devil, who made all the running in the beginning, not Clare. I know about the night you seduced her.''The night I what?' he shouted.

'Don't bellow at me like that, you thrawn devil. Clare told me that night. She was in tears, hysterical. You'd forced her ... how could you, Devil? How could you, just to get Chantries? I know why you did it. You never loved her, I know that. It was Chantries you really wanted, and it was for Chantries that you sacrificed our love.'

He stood very still. There was silence for a long moment. Then he said soberly, 'The night I met her in the hayfield?'

'Yes,' she said, her throat raw with unshed tears. 'That night. Devil Haggard.'

'She went straight back and told you I'd seduced her?''Yes.'

'And within a week you'd gone to Africa,' he said very slowly and quietly.She did not answer.

Devil went on, as if reciting a story, 'Then your father wrote to say you were going to marry one of the richest men in the world, and Clare showed me the letter, and I..." He broke off suddenly.'You married her,' Oriel said.

'God in heaven!' he shouted, smashing his fist against the wall of the lodge. 'Great God in heaven, I married her ..

Oriel stared at him. For a moment she saw him, his dark face distraught, his blue eyes wet with tears. He put a hand in front of his face as if to hide his emotion from her, and she saw the red blood running thickly from his grazed hand. She exclaimed in shock:'You've hurt yourself!'

He gave a great groan of pain and stumbled away into the darkness, she heard him running away through the long grass. Then the wind blew gently and she could only hear the leaves turning on the trees in an autumnal dance and the soft sea murmur of the grass.

CHAPTER FIVE

A WEEK later Joan Warne came over to the lodge to tea. They sat in the stark little room on a pair o£ uncomfortable old chairs and drank from two handmade pottery mugs. 'I'm sorry for the disorder,' Oriel apologised. 'I'm just camping out here until Chantries is fit to live in.''When will that be?'7

"Another six months at this rate,' grimaced Oriel.'Is the work going well?'

"Very well, but very slowly. The rebuilding is taking longer than I'd imagined. They keep finding other things wrong. All the floorboards on the top floor have had to be replaced because they had rotted.'

'Builders perpetuate themselves, Phil says,' Joan smiled.Oriel laughed. 'He knows what he's talking about! I'm

beginning to think I shall never get rid of them.'Joan drank slowly, then looked at her over the rim of her

mug. 'Phil went up to Devil's Leap this morning.'Oriel tensed. 'Yes?'

'Your cousin is worse, much worse—a bad attack in the night. Phil wanted to take her to hospital, but she wouldn't go, and her brute of a husbandwouldn't agree to take her there.''How can he be so cruel? Poor Clare..’

'Phil said she was as yellow as saffron. Her liver is collapsing. She can't go on like this.''If they operated, could they save her?'

Joan sighed and shook her head. 'I'm afraid not. There's nothing that can be done to repair the damage, but the process can be halted and alleviated in the right hospital. But first we have to get her there. Left at home she'll go on drinking until she dies.'

When Joan had gone, Oriel sat staring at the little window, watching the wind fling the bright red leaves of the maple to and fro outside. She thought of Clare as a child. They had never been very close—Clare had always been a secretive, possessive child—but their shared childhood had given them a link which time could not entirely sever. How tragic life had been for

Clare, how much kinder to herself. What terrible things life did to some people!

Devil must be forced to send Clare to hospital. It was his duty as a human being, let alone as a husband.

Joan had hinted that Devil wanted Clare to die, that he encouraged her to drink in the hope that she would die. Could Joan be right? Devil had always been a difficult, violent, savage man, but he had not been that wicked. Surely Joan couldn't be right?

She went out to walk around the park in the dying light. The sky grew pale and cold and the air was Chill against her skin.

She heard footsteps on the gravel path, and turning she saw Devil in a black polo-neck sweater and black cord trousers.She waited until he came up to her. They looked at each other soberly, like old adversaries as another duel begins.'Devil, Clare must go to hospital,' she began briskly.He shrugged. 'She refuses.''You could persuade her.'His lip wrinkled. 'Me?''She'd do anything for you.''Anything but leave me,' he said drily.'Even that if you promised to visit her often enough,' she said.He sighed. 'Do you think I haven't tried?'There was a silence. He looked at her harshly. 'I see. You think I want her to die. Well, perhaps I do, but I wouldn't kill her.''Not even let her die by neglect?' she asked coldly.He gave a hoarse burst of laughter. 'How ironic 1''What?''That you should upbraid me for hating Clare I God, what damned ironies life inflicts upon us.'

'Will you talk to Clare? Persuade her to save her life?'He sighed. 'I suppose so.' He looked past her at the Lodge. 'Aren't you going to ask me in for a cup of coffee?'She silently shook her head.'Oh, wise young judge,' he mocked. 'Afraid I'll rape you, darling?'Oriel flushed. 'Goodnight, Devil.' She turned togo back indoors, but he came with her. She halted and looked at him bitterly. ‘Go back to your wife, Devil.'

He put a hand slowly to her hair which was floating free tonight in a sleek golden curtain over her shoulders. She flinched away. He smiled grimly, then raised one long silken strand to his lips and kissed it.'Goodnight, Oriel.'

She pulled away and slammed the door behind her. After a moment she heard him move away over the gravel. She closed her eyes wearily.

It was hard to lie in bed at night and know that out there in the breathing darkness Devil was prowling around the park like a savage beast. She bolted the doors at both sides of the room then undressed and slid into bed. She could not get to sleep. Her nerves were stretched to breaking point with listening for his step upon the path, his knock upon the curtained windowpane.

What did he want of her, constantly circling the house like a leopard or a black jaguar, his eyes fixed on the light of her window?

She did not dare to turn out the light, but at last she fell asleep with it on, and awoke to hear the birds singing out in the trees of the park. Her head ached with weariness. She got up reluctantly and washed with some difficulty. She had to take her

baths up at the pub for the moment, but she was able to use lukewarm water in an ancient tin bowl for washing night and morning.

She laughed abruptly, imagining Alan's face if he saw her doing this now. His worst fears would be realised. She must indeed be mad to be living like this when she could go anywhere, do anything. It would be impossible to get Alan to understand that this was what she wanted to do, this was where she wanted to be—here at Chantries, in sight of her old home, waiting for it to be ready for her.

She drove into the village to do some shopping, and met Joan on the pavement outside the little village shop.

Joan's face was flushed with excitement when she saw the Rolls. 'Oriel, guess what has happened?'

Joan's broad smile meant that it was not a catastrophic happening, so Oriel smiled back. 'Well? I give up.'

'Devil Haggard drove his wife down to us last night and Phil got her a bed in the hospital! What do you think of that? We were wrong about him.'

Oriel concealed her exultation. 'I'm very glad,' she said quietly. So Devil had after all done what she asked!

'Will you visit her?' Joan asked eagerly. 'He can hardly stop you seeing her while she's in hospital.'

Oriel nodded. 'I shall ask if she'll see me, anyway.''Take her some books to read,' Joan advised. 'She'll be there

for a long while.''Do they think they can help her?'

Joan shrugged. 'They can lessen her pain, anyway, but, as I told you, there's no cure.'

Oriel nodded and sighed. 'Why do people drink themselves sick like that?''Anyone married to that man would take to drink,' Joan said darkly.Oriel laughed. 'Have you ever actually met him, Joan?''I've seen him in the distance, a big, black-haired brute with piercing eyes. I saw him on that stallion of his at the Chantries sale. He looked at if he would ride over anyone who got in his way.'Yes, thought Oriel, he probably would. She knew what Joan meant. Then a thought occurred to her. 'Joan, who's looking after their child?''Linnet? I suppose her grandmother looks after her.''Does Linnet go to the village school?'Joan shook her head. 'She hasn't yet started school, I believe. She's only just five and there were no places left for her this term, so she starts after Christmas.''I would like to see her,' Oriel murmured.'Why don't you go up and visit them?' Joan stared at her. 'After all, you are Mrs Haggard's cousin. Or do you suspect he wouldn't even let you see the child?''I don't know what he would do,' Oriel admitted. 'He's quite unpredictable.''Do you think he's mad?' Joan lowered her voice with a sidelong, conspiratorial glance. 'His behaviour is so erratic!'Oriel thought of him last night prowling around the park, and shivered.She went back to the Lodge and changed into a blue denim jeans suit which she rarely wore—she did not want to ruin any more Paris originals climbing up Primrose Bank. As she

reached the top of the hill she heard laughter, then someone ran out of a clump of tangled hazels, dark hair flying in the wind.

It was a little girl in a blue catsuit. She skidded to a halt as she saw Oriel and stared. Oriel stared back, taking in the slight boyish figure, the untidy dark hair, the blue eyes so reminiscent of Devil's. This could only be Linnet.

Someone else emerged from the hazels, carrying a large red plastic ball. 'Hallo, Oriel.'

She smiled hesitantly. Devil's mother had always been faintly hostile towards her in the past, probably fearing that their friendship might lead to yet more problems. Now Oriel was not certain whether she would be made welcome or asked to leave at once.

Ann Dervil was a tall, thin woman with silver- streaked black hair and her son's bright blue eyes. She had a broad Yorkshire accent and a direct, aggressive stare.

Now she came straight to the point. 'Linnet, love, go on up to the house. I'll be there directly.'

Linnet glanced curiously at Oriel again, but nodded. 'Yes, Gran.'

As she passed her, Oriel smiled at her, and the child, after a brief pause, smiled back, revealing an engaging gap between her two front teeth and a dimple in her cheek.

What d'ye want, Oriel?' Ann Dervil asked as the child vanished into the house.'To see Linnet,' Oriel replied as directly.

Ann nodded slowly. 'I can understand you might wish to see how she's being looked after. Well, you've seen her. She's bonny and fair spoilt by her father. You've no cause to worry about her.'

'What effect has her mother's illness had on her, though? I can guess that there've been things done and said up here in the last year which no child should have known about.'

'Devil's kept all that away from her as best he could. He'd no wish to hurt the child. I tell you, he fair dotes on her.' Ann's blue eyes narrowed scornfully. 'There's nowt o' her mother in the child.' She shrugged. 'Oh, I grant my lad's no angel, but he's got more spunk in his little finger than your cousin Clare has in her whole sickly body. Why he married her I'll never know. She's been a poor bargain to him.'

'I don't think he has done her much good, either,' Oriel said bitterly.

Ann sniffed. 'Aye. Well, he had much to put up with, right from t'start. She were no housewife, I can tell you. Used to being waited on hand and foot and expected me to run after her, fetching and carrying all day. Selfish, lazy and idle. I won't pre-tend I liked her. She fair put my back up—treated me like dirt. Many's the time she's flung Devil's birth up at me, calling me foul names I'd not put my tongue tol I tell you straight, Oriel, she were no good.'

'You speak as if she was dead already,' Oriel said.'I wish she was—aye, and I don't mind who hears me say it.

She's poison to my son and poison to her own child.' She looked frankly at Oriel. 'Devil'd have done better to wed you, you know that.'

'I wouldn't have brought him Chantries then,' Oriel said coldly. 'And it was the hope of getting Chantries that persuaded him to take Clare.'

Ann stared at her silently. After a moment she lifted her thin shoulders in a shrug. 'He's never discussed it with me, so I can't

answer that. Keeps his own counsel, does Devil.' She glanced at the house. 'I must go in to Linnet. You'd best go now. Devil wouldn't want to find you here.'

Oriel nodded. 'Will you tell him I want to see Linnet? I would like to get to know her.'

'I'll tell him, but I don't hold out much hope. Devil prefers to keep himself to himself.' Ann grimaced. 'That saucy young woman helps to look after t'child now. I thought we'd see t'back of her when Clare went into hospital, but no, Devil says she's to stay on and help me with t'child because he reckons I've enough to do with t'house without caring for children too. Happen he's right, but I can't say as I care for that young madam.'

Oriel did not reply. She smiled at Ann and said a courteous goodbye, then turned away.

Ann called out to her suddenly, 'When will Chantries be open again? They say as you're spending a fortune on t'old place.'

'You must come down and see it when it's finished,' Oriel told her.

Ann gave a hoarse croak of amusement. 'What me? Eh, old Jerry'd turn in his grave. I were good enough to bed, but not to wed.'

Oriel was embarrassed by this frankness and only smiled. 'Well, you have a standing invitation to come and see the house whenever you please.'

When she got back to Chantries she found Alan waiting for her. He had sprung a surprise visit, perhaps in the hope of finding out what was keeping her down here. He smiled at her, raising one polite eyebrow incredulously at her denim suit.'You even look different,' he informed her.

She laughed. 'What are you doing here, Alan? No, never mind, come to the Lodge for tea and tell me all about it.'

'The Lodge? Oh, this place where you're camping out. The men have been telling me about it— it sounds appalling. Oriel, why don't you come back to London? What on earth do you find to do down here? The village is the dullest place I ever saw, and I can't imagine you living like a peasant in this hovel you've discovered.'

'Stop talking nonsense, Alan,' she said calmly. 'What did you think of the way the work is going on? The men are doing a good job, aren't they?'

'Fine,' he nodded. 'But they're very slow. The house won't be fit to live in for months.'

They arrived at the lodge and Alan whistled in disbelief at what he saw. 'You're actually living in this place? My God, it's a slum, only fit for demolition!'

'On the contrary, the building itself is perfectly sound. It needs repairs and modernisation, but whenI move into Chantries I shall have this place done up and let it. I've already got a tenant lined up, in fact.'"He must be desperate!''Yes, I think he is,' Oriel agreed. "Which is why I'm glad I can help him.''The Lady Bountiful, Oriel?' Alan asked drily.She smiled at him. 'Sarcasm, Alan?'He grinned. 'I've brought various papers down for you to look over, then sign. I wish you'd come back to London, then these treks wouldn't be necessary.''I'm sure the wheels of Mellstock Enterprises will keep on turning wherever I happen to live,' she said lightly.

'Oh, we can manage, but it would make it much easier for me if you were more accessible.'She began to prepare a meal, moving about deftly while he sat back and watched her in dry amusement. Once she caught him grinning, and asked him what was so funny.'To see you playing at being a housewife,' he said. 'Do you realise, I've never seen you in this role before?''Doesn't the role suit me?''Oh, you play it very well, but it isn't the Oriel I know,' he said rather discontentedly.'We all change, Alan.''But I don't want you to change,' he said."I'm sorry,' she said gently, 'but you aren't King Canute, Alan. You can't hold back the tide. It's two years since Egon died. I've had time to adjust, timeto realise what I want to do with the rest of my life.'

As she passed him, he caught her wrists and pulled her down on to his lap, his face rather flushed. 'I've waited two years to say this,' he said thickly. 'Oriel, I love you ..'Alan, please,' she began, embarrassed.

He bent his head and began to kiss her, but she struggled, turning her head to one side, so that his kiss landed on her cheek, not her lips. 'Alan, don't,' she muttered.

'Why not?' he said, his voice full of hurt pride. 'Don't you like me? You've always been so friendly and encouraging. I was only waiting for you to get over Egon, waiting for you to give me a sign ...'

'Alan, I like you very much, but I could never love you,' she told him gently. 'I'm sorry if you want more than that. I could never give you what you want.'

'You must have known how I felt!''I may have suspected it, but I wasn't sure, and as you never

said anything I put it out of my mind.''Is there someone else? Is that it?' He stared down at her,

holding her down by her shoulders. 'Another man down here? Yes, that explains your sudden desire to live in the back of beyond I Who have you found, Oriel? Some hobnailed farmer with brawny arms and a neck like a bull? A complete contrast to Egon?'

'Let me go, Alan!' She was suddenly fiercely angry, perhaps because his sarcastic description bore some faint resemblance to Devil.

'I'm damned if I will/ he said, his face filled with angry jealousy.

She struggled again, but he was too strong for her. He held her down against the arm of the chair and bent over her, kissing her throat and chin, then moving slowly upwards to kiss her mouth with a new passion which startled her. She had not thought Alan capable of such emotion. Under the sting of jealousy, however, he had become almost violent, and his kiss silenced her protests.

When he at last released her, she sprang off his lap, pushing back her hair with trembling hands.

Then she froze. Framed in the window like an avenging spirit, Devil was watching them. He carried his gun over his arm and his face was black with rage.

Unaware of this observer, Alan got up, too, and seized her hand, kissing it penitently. 'I'm sorry, darling—I lost my temper. But at least you know how I feel and ... what are you staring at?' He swivelled, realising at last that she was rigidly

staring at the window behind him, but even as he turned Devil moved out of sight, and all that met Alan's eyes was the wind moving in the maple tree. 'What was it?' He looked back at Oriel.

She turned away, her head drooping. 'Nothing. Oh, Alan, I'm sorry. I don't want you to get the wrong impression, so I'll have to be brutally honest with you. I do not and cannot love you. In a way, I wish I could, but I know I never will.'

He was silent for a long time, then he said stiffly, 'Well, honesty is said to be the best policy. But I shan't give up hope. One day you may change your mind. I can wait.''Don't wait, Alan,' she pleaded. 'Please, don't waste your life like that.''It's my life. I'll waste it if I want to,' he said with bitterness.'Shall we eat now?' she suggested humbly. 'Then you can show me these documents and I'll sign them for you.'He nodded. 'Just as you like.''Where are you staying tonight?''That ghastly pub down in the village,' he said sulkily.'Have you booked an evening meal?'He nodded. 'I ordered for both of us. I thought you might appreciate a little good cooking for a change. That Hezekiah chap of yours said he would do us steaks.''Sounds marvellous,' she said gratefully. 'Thank you.''I should wait until you taste it. I doubt if that chap knows what to do with a steak. It'll probably taste like boot leather.'They sat, drinking the tea and nibbling bread and butter, while Alan coldly explained the various papers he had brought down for her to see. Oriel signed them and he stuffed them casually back into his briefcase.

Then they drove down to the village, left Alan's car outside the pub and went for a stroll so that he could take a proper look at Torby.

'Dead as a doornail,' Alan complained later. 'How can you stand it?'

'I was born and brought up here, remember. I like it,' Oriel said calmly. 'Also, being on the spot, I can keep an eye on the work at Chantries, and I'm in the middle of negotiations for some horses. I shall ride quite a bit in future, and I want a good pony for Anatole when he comes down to stay.''How does he like his school?'

'Very well, if his letters are anything to go by. He writes to me every weekend. It's compulsory, or I might not get a line. He writes very short letters, but the general gist of them sounds hopeful. They're mostly about sport. He's got very keen on football and rugger.'

'Hmm, they have quite a reputation for rugger, that school,' nodded Alan.

'I shall be visiting him at half-term. I'll pick him up and take him to London for the weekend.'

'I would like to see the boy again/ Alan said. 'If you'll allow me to take him to see some rugger at Twickenham?'

'That's very kind of you, Alan. He'd like that. Thank you.'Alan shrugged. 'My pleasure.' He had regained a little of his

usual composure, but she could detect a trace of sulkiness behind his calm behaviour.'Have you heard from Renée?' he asked.

'A postcard from Jamaica. She's having a wonderful time.'Their dinner was perfectly edible, but Alan complained to

her that Hezekiah's service left much to be desired. 'I wish he

wouldn't bang things down on the table like that.'Oriel was amused. 'Poor Alan! I'm sorry.'

He looked at her grimly. 'Don't laugh at me, Oriel.''I wasn't,' she protested.

'I know when you have your tongue in your cheek,' he said with a frown.

He drove her back to the Lodge in his car, dropped her, refused her offer of a nightcap, and drove away, still sulking. She let herself into the cottage with a sigh of relief. She hoped Alan would not visit her for a long time after this. The evening had been a terrible strain. He was a visitor from another world, a world she had forgotten and did not want to be reminded of at present.

She walked over to draw the curtains, then stood very still as Devil's face appeared on the other side of the window. He made a sign to her, indicating that he wished to be admitted. She shook her head.'Go away,' she mouthed.

His brows jerked together. He turned and vanished. Oriel hurriedly moved back across the room, but was too late. He was already in the cottage. She heard him climbing through one of the broken windows and crunching across the broken glass which littered the floor. Ena was coming back soon to sweep it all up, but so far she had not got round to doing it.

Oriel slammed the door of the room shut and put her hand up to the bolt.'Let me in,' Devil commanded in his deep, incisive voice.'Go away,' she repeated.'Unbolt this door or I'll kick it in,' he snapped.

'If you did anything stupid I would call the police, and this time I mean it,' she threatened.'I don't give a damn for the police,' he said. 'Unbolt this door, woman!''No!'She heard him put his shotgun down, and terror rose in her throat. 'All right,' she shouted. 'AH right, you wicked devil, I'll unbolt it!'He came in like a whirlwind and they faced each other. His wild blue eyes raked her from head to foot, a sneer twisting his hard mouth.'I had a notion your fancy man'd stay the night,' he said maliciously.'Not tonight,' she said calmly.The blue eyes flashed. 'Other nights, maybe?''Maybe,' she said.His large hands clenched at his sides. 'If he'd been here I was going to take the pleasure of spoiling his face for him.''Don't be so damned stupid,' she flung, 'What business is it of yours who sleeps with me?'In a stride he was in front of her, grabbing her upper arms in a vice-like grip that hurt. 'By God, you'll drive me insane, Oriel...''How many more women do you want, Devil Haggard? You have a wife and a mistress already. Don't bite off more than you can chew.'

He laughed furiously. 'You can spit like a cat with its back arched I'

'How dare you come here and threaten me!' she shouted back. 'I'm not afraid of you, Devil. I warn you, if I ever catch you near this place again, I'll shoot for the whites of your eyes!'

'Wildcat,' he mocked. 'Tell me the truth about that smooth-suited young executive type. How long has it been going on?'

'He wants to marry me.' It gave her pleasure to tell him that. It took the smile off his face.

'You or the Mellstock fortune?' The question was delivered bitingly.

'What did it look like?' she asked lightly. 'Oh, I've no doubt my money enhances my attraction for Alan, but I have other attributes.'

'I've noticed them,' he said sardonically. His blue eyes travelled down her body appreciatively. 'What one might call gilt-edged stock.'

She was forced to laugh, and he grinned at her. 'That's better. What answer did you give your ardent suitor?'

Oriel did not reply, her slanting green eyes taunting him.Devil caught her closer and bit her ear. She gave a little yelp

of pain. 'You're a brute, do you know that?''Aren't you going to thank me for taking Clare to hospital?'

he asked softly.'You ought to have done it months ago. You were going to

let her die!''For God's sake,' he said, exasperated. 'I've tried, on my

honour. I've tried to get her to go, but she always refused. So last night I put some sleeping pills in her cocoa and when she was out for the count I drove her down to Dr Warne and told him she could go into hospital. It wasn't unusual for her to be in a drunken stupor. Warne didn't suspect I'd drugged her. They took her into hospital, so now she's being properly looked after, just as you wanted.'

She looked up at him gravely. 'You shouldn't have married her if you meant to be so cruel to her.'

'I didn't intend to be cruel,' he denied angrily. 'I married her without loving her. That was my crime, and I've paid for it. It was knowing that that drove her to drink, but, Oriel, she knew when she married me. God above 1 She begged me to marry her. She said she didn't care whether I loved her or not. She said it then, but afterwards it was another story.'Oriel sighed. 'You must go. It's so late.''Must I?' His gaze was speculative. 'Why?'

'Oh, Devil...' She moved restlessly, aware of him in every fibre. She did not want him to go. She wanted him to stay; her body cried out for him. She longed to sink into his arms and forget everything but her own driving hunger. But there was Clare, and his child Linnet, and her own self-respect. The barriers between them were too great.'You must go,' she repeated huskily.

'I want you,' he said abruptly. 'I want you as I've never wanted anything before, even Chantries ... Don't send me away tonight, my dearest. Let me stay. I'm half out of my mind with loving you and if I have to go back up to Devil's Leap unsatisfied I can't be responsible for what I'll do. Say yes to me tonight or I'll never ask you again.'

She stared at him, his words shocking her beyond belief. 'Devil, I can't... you're married...'

'Forget Clare. Forget everything. Say yes now.' He stared down at her hungrily, his blue eyes intense.

'No, Devil,' she whispered miserably, knowing her own terrible desire to say yes but fighting it down.

'My God, you ..His voice soared, shaking with rage. He looked at her with black ferocity. 'You've refused me now. That was your last chance. I'll not forget this. Next time you'll beg me on your bended knees, my girl. You'll come crawling to me and I'll throw you out or take you, as I see fit, but I'll never lower my pride or self-respect for you again, Oriel.'

The door slammed behind him and she stood, staring at it, shivering as though with cold. Shock rushed over her in waves. She would never forget the look on his face as long as she lived. It would haunt her forever.

CHAPTER SIX

NEXT morning Oriel called on Ena and arranged for her to tidy the rest of the lodge, saw the foreman at Chantries and approved the schedule for the next two weeks, then drove back to London in the Rolls, feeling rather like a criminal fleeing from detection, and caught a plane to California to join Renée in Los Angeles for a few weeks' holiday. The weather was unseasonably hot on the day of her arrival, and she stepped off the plane to find the sun burning overhead like a great bronze coin, and the heat bouncing off the runway in waves. Before she reached the shade of the airport lounge her clothes were wet with perspiration and her head was beginning to ache intolerably.

She took a taxi to Renée's hotel. The traffic streamed along the highways like lemmings leaving for the horizon. The taxi driver played his radio at a high pitch, whistling between his discoloured teeth to the pop music and talking to her over his shoulder with amiable curiosity in between times. 'First visit

here, lady? English, aren't you? Thought so. I can tell 'em a mile off...' As though she were a member of a remote tribe, and, after her time in the misty solitudes of the Yorkshire Dales, she felt rather like a visitor from another time and place. She smiled, thinking how contradictory life was at times.She had travelled thousands of miles in a brief space of time, from one extreme way of life to another, and the sudden change made her feel giddy.

Renée's hotel was huge, impersonal and lavishly comfortable, with deep-piled carpets and smooth- running lifts, air-conditioning and elegantly furnished rooms.

Renée was amiably incurious when she met her at the door of her suite. Oriel had been dreading too many questions. She had sent Renée a telegram before she left London, but the short notice must have aroused some sort of curiosity, and she had expected to be faced with unanswerable questions.

'How lovely to see you, darling,' Renée merely said. 'I'm delighted you decided to join me. We can explore California together now. How is Anatole? What was the weather like in England?'

Oriel replied eagerly, finding these questions easier to answer than the ones she had been dreading.

Mrs Weedon and Iris brought them glasses of pre- luncheon sherry, and responded delightedly to Oriel's questions about their holiday. They had clearly had the time of their lives, and were eager to take a bus-tour of Hollywood to see the homes of their favourite stars.

'We're going tomorrow,' Iris beamed. 'Oh, I can't wait, Mrs Mellstock. I'm so excited I'm sure I shall be sick 1''I hope you won't,' Renée said gravely.

Oriel winked at Mrs Weedon. 'Oh, I'm sure Iris will be O.K. when the time comes.'

'Are you sure you can manage without us for a whole day, Mrs Mellstock?' they asked Renée anxiously.

'Now that my daughter-in-law has arrived I shall be just fine,' she nodded.

'I believe you're picking up an American accent,' Oriel teased her mother-in-law. 'What will Anatole say when he finds his granny returning with a foreign accent?'

'Nonsense, my dear,' Renée said calmly, laughing. 'Although it's very easy to pick up the American idiom. One can scarcely avoid it when one hears these phrases all around one all day. I've started to say elevator instead of lift and ask for the check instead of the bill. Otherwise one is not always under-stood, of course.'

'Very wise of you,' Oriel agreed. 'Now, what shall we do tomorrow?' She gave Renée a little teasing smile. 'I suppose you wouldn't like to take a bus-tour of Hollywood?'

With great dignity, Renée said, 'I should like to go shopping and have a leisurely lunch in Los Angeles, thank you.'

Oriel laughed. 'Oh, you can't go back home without having seen Hollywood I'Renée's eyes gleamed. 'I must admit...'

'I knew it,' Oriel laughed, again. 'Why not give in? We're tourists, Renée dear, so let's do what the tourists do.'

Renée smiled at her. 'I've missed you so much, Oriel.' Her voice was faintly husky. 'I had no idea how much I relied on your company until we leftEngland. Mrs Weedon and Iris are kindness itself, but they're not family.'

'Of course they aren't,' Oriel nodded. 'Well, now I'm here, we shall have a wonderful time.'

The next few days were a whirl of excited activity. They hired a chauffeur-driven car, since Oriel did not feel up to facing the rigours of American traffic, and drove backwards and forwards across California. They spent one whole day in San Francisco, riding on the famous clanging trams which slid up and down the hills on which the city had been built, between white colonial houses and tree-lined boulevards. They visited Nob Hill, where the nouveau riche of San Francisco once lived in the plush grandeur of Edwardian splendour, gazing down myopic- ally upon the crowded streets of the poor. As they drove across the great steel span of the Golden Gate bridge, the blue sky around them, the blue water beneath, only the merest wisp of mist hanging in faint white veils on the horizon, Renée sighed, 'What a view!''Romantic, isn't it?' Oriel smiled.

They ate a sea-food lunch down at the waterfront, eating at a little white table under a striped umbrella, listening to the strumming of a bearded young man playing the guitar. Renée gestured to him, and after a moment's surprised pause he came over to them. Close up, he was startlingly handsome, with liquid dark eyes and curly hair.

'Do you play Spanish music, young man?' Renée asked.He fingered his beard, surveying them. 'Maybe.'Renée pushed some money at him. 'Then play that, and stop

making my head ache with that dreadful noise.'He looked at the money, then grinned, 'Anything you say,

lady.'

Renée leaned back approvingly as he began to play classical Spanish guitar music, the melancholy, haunting notes falling into the still, hot Californian air with a sound like frozen crystal, tinkling in a windswept forest.

'He's quite good,' she murmured to Oriel. 'Better than I'd expected. Why, though, if he can play like this does he waste his time with that other dreadful stuff?'

'I suppose the other stuff is usually more popular,' Oriel said quietly.

When he had finished the young man bowed to them, then, to their discomfited surprise, drew up a chair and joined them at their table.

'First time in years I've been paid to play good music,' he said. He looked at Oriel admiringly. 'You're not in movies, are you? You look kind of familiar.'

She smiled faintly, guessing that he had seen a photograph of her in a newspaper at some time. 'No,' she denied, shaking her head, 'I'm not in movies.'

'I am,' he said lightly. He saw their glances of disbelief and grinned. Turning, he shouted at the waiter. 'Hey, Manuel, who am I? Tell these ladies who I am, will you?'

The thin, dark Mexican smiled incredulously. 'They don't know?' Then, bowing to them politely,'This is Lee Tyrwit, the actor and musician. You never saw the movie Babylon Waters? He was in that.'

Oriel vaguely remembered having heard of the film. It had been released in London a year ago, but she had not seen it. She smiled apologetically at Lee Tyrwit. 'I'm afraid...'

He put up a slender, tanned hand. 'Don't say it. You never heard of it. Or me.'

'I've heard of the film,' she admitted.He grinned. 'But not of me? Well, there you go. I'm not

boasting, you know. I'm just handing you an identity check. You know who I am now.' His bright dark eyes questioned her.

She hesitated. 'We're not Americans,' she said quietly.His wry glance was shrewd. 'You prefer to remain

anonymous? I'm sure I've seen you somewhere before. You're famous for something. I tell you, I've got a little bell in my head that rings whenever I see a face, and it rings every time I look at you...'

Renée stood up. 'We must go now, I'm afraid,' she said stiffly.

Oriel called the waiter and paid him, then motioned to their hired car to roll forward from its parking spot and pick them up. Lee Tyrwit stood, hands on hips, watching them. Oriel gave him a slight smile.'Nice to have met you. Goodbye...''Au revoir,' he said.

He watched her as she slid into the car, her long slender legs a lovely golden brown after her days in the Californian sun, her navy blue dress swirling gracefully around her thighs as she moved. She glanced back as they drew away. Lee Tyrwit still stood there staring after them.

'I don't like being picked up by strange young men like that/ Renée said.Oriel burst out laughing. 'Oh, Renée!'

'I don't see what's funny in that.' Renée said disapprovingly. 'We only have that waiter's word for it that that young man was a musician and actor. They might be hand in glove.'

'Well, it doesn't matter. We'll never see him again.' Oriel said easily.

She was wrong. Two nights later, in an exclusive restaurant, they saw him across the room at a table near the band, looking nothing like the casually dressed young hippy they had seen at the waterfront. Tonight he wore evening clothes; well-cut and expensive evening clothes. His beard was neatly trimmed—and he wore a stiff white evening shirt. Oriel almost did not recognise him.

'My eyes are not good enough.' Renée complained, peering across the room myopically. 'Are you sure it is the same man?''Certain.' said Oriel, nodding.

At that moment he turned his head and saw her, and a smile lit his face. Standing up, he came towards their table, abandoning his companion, who stared after him with a sulky expression on her lovely face.

'Well met by lamplight, proud Titania.' he murmured, bowing to Oriel. 'I told you it was au revoir, not goodbye, didn't I?''It is a small world,' she agreed gravely.'May I be bold enough to ask you for a dance?' he enquired lightly, indicating the tiny postage- stamp size dance floor near the band's raised dais. A few couples were dancing to the music, but Oriel hesitated.'Well, thank you, but...''Oh, come on,' he said pleadingly.She shrugged, glancing at Renée. 'Would you mind if...?'Renée looked doubtful. 'You must decide for yourself, my dear.''Think of my reputation,' he begged. 'I'm losing face standing here getting the cold shoulder ...'

She laughed. 'Oh, very well...'They moved on to the dance floor and began to dance. He looked down at her. 'Ready to tell me who you are yet?'She shook her head. 'I'm a mystery woman.''And your mother?''Mother-in-law,' she said gently.'Oh, my,' he hissed. 'Now that is a pity. I guess I've put you in a spot. Will she tell your husband?''He's dead,' she said.He looked horrified, his cheeks growing red. 'God, I'm sorry. How long...?''Two years.'He looked at her in astonishment. "And you're still running around loose? Wow! Either he was some guy or you're a very choosy lady.''Could be both,' Oriel returned lightly.'True,' he nodded. 'You're one of the loveliest woman I've ever seen. Know that?'She smiled. 'Thank you.''I love that English manner of yours—cool ice- maiden stuff. Your hair and skin are superb. I want to date you."Oriel was forced to laugh, looking at him. 'You're very direct. You don't waste time or words, do you?'A flashlight exploded and she glanced around in astonishment, only to realise with a shock that the photographer had snatched a picture of them.'Oh no!' she burst out, aghast.'Don't worry,' he said soothingly. 'They're only interested in me, I promise you 1'

She looked at him wryly. 'That,' she said, 'is what you think, Mr Tyrwit.' She broke out of his embrace. 'I'm afraid it's time we left. Thank you for the dance. Goodnight.'He followed her back to her table, protesting, 'Look, what's wrong? Won't you stay for a while? Let me buy you a drink?'Renée was already on her feet, her face cold. 'Goodnight,' she said with glacial irritation.Oriel followed her, giving him a last cool smile.In their car, Renée said flatly, 'That was a pity. I do hate to see gossip items about us in the papers.''Yes,' Oriel agreed.Egon had always deliberately tried to isolate his family from the inevitable publicity attracted by the rich, and Oriel had always been grateful to him for his protection. She hoped that the photographer would not recognise her or be able to find anyone to identify her.

However, next day she was disturbed to find herself prominently displayed in the gossip columns, beside the photograph of herself and Lee Tyrwit, together with various elaborated theories about their so-called 'relationship', even going so far as to hint at forthcoming announcements about marriage.

She stared at the papers angrily. It was really too bad! She couldn't even dance with a total stranger without journalists putting two and two together and making a million.

But worse was to come. The telephone rang continually all morning. Oriel was asked to give interviews to women's magazines, questioned by hard- pressing reporters, pestered by anonymous callers, until she asked the switchboard not to put

any more calls through to her room without checking with her first.

'We'll have to lunch in the hotel,' she told Renée crossly. 'The manager just rang to say there are floods of reporters and cameramen downstairs waiting to catch me as I leave the hotel.'

'That young man has much to answer for.' Renée said with asperity.

'I'm not feeling too friendly towards him myself.' Oriel agreed grimly.

Since the first interest in her after Egon's death had died down, she had been refreshingly free of this sort of publicity, and she was furious to find herself attracting it once more. She had become over- confident or she would never have danced with Lee Tyrwit in such a public place.

They were served lunch in their room at one o'clock, and after picking at a little salad and ham, Renée retired to take a nap. All this sightseeing was exhausting her, she said. Angry with herself for having permitted Renée to get overtired, Oriel suggested that they might go somewhere quiet for a restful break. 'Somewhere in the hills, perhaps? A remote hotel by a mountain lake? Something like that.'

Renée sighed, rather pale and drawn. 'We'll talk about it.'An hour later Lee Tyrwit arrived at the door of the suite

with an enormous gilt basket of flowers in one hand. He gave her a wry, humorously self- accusing grin. 'Come to make my peace, lady. Don't slam the door in my face.'

'I hope no one saw you with that monstrosity.' she said acidly, gazing at him with irritation.

He looked down at the flowers. 'I had these smuggled up from the florist in the lobby, but I guess I was seen coming up

here. I'm afraid the press gang are after us.' He was wearing dark glasses, but they proved a thin disguise. That beard was a giveaway.

'My mother-in-law is resting. I'm afraid I can't talk.' she said.

'Look, Mrs Mellstock, I just wanted to say how sorry I am.' he told her. 'You should have told me who you were—I would have been more careful. I thought you were some English actress out to make a name over here. It never occurred to me that you were a real rich cat.'

She had to laugh at his expression. 'It wasn't your fault. Please, forget it. I shall be leaving for England again soon.'

'I'm real sorry to hear that,' he said. He extended his hand. 'It was nice knowing you, even if it was short and sweet.'

'Thank you,' she said, smiling. 'It was very interesting to meet you, too.'

When he had gone she went over to the window and stared down over the city. A sudden longing for England came over her. She had come away to escape Devil. Now all she wanted was to get back.

I'm nothing but a yo-yo, she told herself. I keep swinging wildly back and forth, coming to rest nowhere. I can't get rid of this restless desire to keep moving. What on earth is wrong with me? She stared at the bright basket of flowers Lee had brought her. They were all beautiful, well-nigh perfect blossoms, arranged delightfully inside their cellophane wrapper, yet she knew that she had had more pleasure from one stem of harebells found growing wild on the hillsides above Chantries than she got now from this expensive bouquet.

I'm not the sophisticated city type, she told herself. For years she had run the luxurious home of a millionaire, dressing and behaving like a woman of the world, but deep down inside herself she knew she was still the gawky, towheaded brat Devil had said he preferred. One part of herself had never left the Dales. She had spiritually roamed there ever since she left home, a melancholy wanderer in an Eden from which she was physically excluded. How many nights had been made blissful by dreams of the heather-scented hillsides and the sound of the becks in spring, running strongly through brown reeds and over grey rock? She had been haunted by the past, forever calling back yesterday.

Renée looked better when she emerged from her room. She eyed askance the basket of flowers. 'I imagine I may guess the donor?''He apologised for the fuss,' Oriel said easily.

'So I should hope! Well, what are we going to do? I can't enjoy a holiday if I'm dogged by reporters.'

Oriel nodded. 'It will be best if I fly back to England.''My dear girl, you only just got here. You're like a cat on hot

bricks these days. I tell you what we'll do —you suggested a quiet mountain hotel; I think that would be an excellent idea. I'll see what can be fixed up.'

A few days later they were peacefully leaning back in canvas chairs beside a blue lake in the mountains, watching wild duck land and take off a few yards away, skidding down the length of the lake with a dramatic flapping of wings.

'This is much better,' Renée said contentedly. 'Are you happy, my dear?'

'Much happier,' Oriel agreed. 'Isn't this scenery superb? It reminds me a little of Scotland.'

Renée nodded. 'I see what you mean, but I think Scotland's scenery is slightly more rugged.'

Their hotel lay back in the pine forests beyond their chairs, the long white building beautifully camouflaged by landscaped gardens which gradually blended into the forest. No reporters had bothered them up here—it was too far off the beaten track. They had enjoyed absolute quiet since their arrival, and Oriel's jagged nerves were beginning to recover in this atmosphere.

'We'll stay here for a few weeks, then fly home in time to see Anatole at half-term,' Renée said with a sigh of satisfaction. She lay back and closed her eyes. Oriel saw with a pang how frail and old she looked. How much longer could she last? She must be protected and cherished, not allowed to exhaust herself trotting around the world alone except for two servants.

Oriel's father had died some years back, and there were no members of the Haggard family left except for Jack, who disliked her, and Clare, who refused to see her and was seriously ill anyway. It was a chilling feeling to be left alone in the world. No amount of money could make up for such loneliness. I must hang on to Renée, she thought desperately. She's the only family I've got apart from Anatole, and he's still so very young.

The days passed with the gentle peacefulness of the wind blowing over the tops of the fir trees during the long summer days. They did very little. Renée ate and slept and took a few restful walks around the lake. Oriel bent all her attention to making her mother-in-law happy. For herself, every day away from Chantries was a day out of her life, but she put

all thought of that behind her for the presentAt last, however, the time came for them to fly back to

England. Excitedly, Mrs Weedon and Iris packed the cases and made last-minute dashes to buy souvenirs. For them the visit had been an absolute success, and they bubbled over with happiness.

The flight was tiring, and Oriel was concerned for Renée, who took on a drawn expression towards the end, but at last they were hovering above London Airport waiting to land.

They were to spend a night at the London flat before driving down to fetch Anatole. Oriel said gently laying a hand over Renée's in her lap, 'I think I should go to get Anatole alone. You're so tired, dear.'Renée sighed. 'Perhaps it would be best.'

So, leaving Renée at the flat, Oriel drove to pick up her son next day, taking the blue Rolls which Renée insisted she did not need.

Anatole was somehow older than when they had last met. He seemed to have shot up in the past weeks. His manner was even more brusquely masculine, and he talked of nothing but 'rugger' and 'House matches' and 'prefects', a breed to whom he showed a mixture of reverence and loathing which amused her. His friends were all mentioned under their surnames with a sort of contemptuous tolerance. He was scathing about both Matron and his housemaster's wife. Women, Oriel gathered, were nuisances.

'You're very young to be a mother,' he mentioned gruffly, seeing a lanky prefect shuffle past and stare at her. 'Most men in my year have mums like stuffed pillowcases, rather cosy and jolly, who wear hats like pudding basins.'

'I'm sorry,' she apologised humbly, realising that she fell far below this high standard.

Anatole gazed at her with his pale eyes, so like his father. 'You're more like a sister, really.' A long pause during which he chewed his lip thoughtfully. 'I could tell chaps you were my sister,' he said.

Oriel giggled and he glared at her. 'Well, it is jolly embarrassing to have a mum who's so young. And why are you going around with this film star? He looked like a creep to me.'

She flushed, laughing. 'Oh, Anatole, I only met him twice. It was just a lot of flim-flam the papers dreamed up.'

"Well, that's something,' he said softly. 'How's Grand'mere?''Rather tired after her holiday,' she admitted. She knew how

much Renée meant to him, and she did not want him to be too alarmed when he saw her.

They drove back to London where he was reunited with Renée. The brief half-term break was over all too soon. Loaded down with sweets and sports gear, Anatole was driven back to the school again. Thoughtfully he said, 'I like Mr Kennet, but he's a bit like a schoolmaster, isn't he?''He is rather,' she agreed, laughing.'You... you aren't going to marry him?'

'No,' she said, 'I'm not going to marry him. Definitely not.'Anatole looked relieved. He pushed another toffee into his

mouth and lapsed into a contented silence. 'Pretty good half on the whole," he said, as they parted. 'Thanks for the sweets, Mum.'

Oriel gravely shook hands, and drove away. Increasingly, she felt him growing away from her, but it seemed right that she

should let him go. He was going to inherit an enormous fortune, and he had to learn independence of mind at an early age.

She rejoined Renée in London and the next few days passed very quietly. Renée slipped back into her usual routine; visiting her hairdresser, choosing new books, seeing the occasional film and playing bridge with her friends. The drawn look slowly left her, and she settled back to enjoy her days as she had always done.

Then one morning a telegram arrived from Devil. Oriel read it twice before she could take in its meaning; the words seemed to dance under her eyes. She put it down on the table slowly, shivering as though with a fever. Renée stared at her in consternation.

'Is it bad news?' Like most people, she found the arrival of a telegram alarming, but Oriel's reaction had been so obviously that of someone who had suffered a bad shock that Renée was doubly disturbed. 'Not Anatole?' her mind leaping at once to the only other person for whom Renée still felt great concern.

'No,' Oriel said slowly and huskily. 'My cousin Clare has died.'

Renée frowned. 'Your cousin Clare?' She had never met any of the Haggards apart from Oriel'sfather, so Clare's death was of no meaning to her. 'I must go back to Torby,' Oriel decided aloud. 'For the funeral? Were you close to this cousin, my dear? You've never mentioned her before.'

'I barely knew her, I suppose,' Oriel said heavily. 'But I must go back for the funeral.'

On her way up north some hours later she thought about that curt telegram. Clare was dead. Devil had said no more than that.

Just three words. Clare is dead. They had a dull finality.

CHAPTER SEVEN

'MY dear, it was so sudden,' Joan Warne explained to her regretfully. 'There was no time to warn you.'

Oriel nodded. 'I understand.' Her tone was heavy. She was emotionally depleted for the moment. The funeral had been a strain. Devil had been grimly withdrawn, accepting the mumbled condolences with a stark nod of recognition. All the traditional forms had been observed. Even the Yorkshire weather had played its part in providing grey, rainy weather all day.

Dr Warne lifted Oriel's chin and studied her face. 'You look as though you need a holiday.''I've just had one,' she said.

He grinned. 'If you're like my wife, you worked harder at being on holiday than you do when you're at work. Take a few days off to rest.'

Drily, she retorted, 'Didn't you know? I'm not exactly fully occupied at any time. It's work I need, not rest.'

He shrugged. 'Well, whatever you say—I'd like to see the smile back in those green eyes of yours and the colour back in your cheeks.'

'Yorkshire will soon put them there,' she said. 'Hezekiah is threatening to "feed me up", as he calls it.''The mind boggles,' Phil Warne laughed. 'Hezekiah's idea of a light meal is an enormous pot of stew, thick enough to stick to your ribs, and tasting of bones and glue.'

'I remember when we were children, we once crept into his larder at night and hung a dead rat among his rabbits and hares—he used to hang his meat for days before he cooked it.'Phil laughed. 'What did he say about the rat?'

'Oh, he knew who'd done it right away. He's canny, is Hezekiah. He cooked it in a little pie, and next time we came round the back door to beg for a bite to eat, he offered us this pie.'

'Good God,' Phil said, horrified. 'You didn't eat it, surely? What a terrible thing to do to kids, however naughty.'

Oriel laughed. 'You don't catch Devil Haggard that easily. Devil knew right away. He looked Hezekiah straight in the face and said sweetly 'Oh, thank you. We'll give it to the Vicar for his tea.'

The Warnes burst out laughing. 'And what did Hezekiah say to that?' Joan asked.

'He went a funny green colour, snatched it out of Devil's hands and swore for about ten minutes. We grabbed some lardy cake from the table and ran like whippets.' Oriel sighed. 'We had a lot of fun in those days.'

'I see how he got the nickname Devil, though,' Phil said with dry amusement.

'His mother seems a nice woman,' Joan put in. She coughed delicately. 'Hard to imagine her being...' She broke off as Phil glared at her.'Joan, your tongue 1'

Oriel smiled. 'I know what Joan means. It's hard to imagine. But we all do wild things when we're young, and the Dervils were all pretty wild, you know. Wild and unpredictable.'

Later, driving back to Chantries, Oriel looked up at Devil's Leap, and wondered exactly what Ann Dervil had had to put up with all those years ago. Why had Uncle Jeremiah refused to marry her when she was carrying his child? Why had he refused to recognise Devil, even to see him on his land? There was, she was sure, some mystery involved. Uncle Jeremiah had been a difficult man, but he had not been so hard that he could have acted like that without a reason.

She was delighted to find the structural work on the house completely finished, and the decorators putting the finishing touches to their work.

She made a tour of the house, looking at the rooms with great pleasure, seeing the remembered beauty of her childhood flashing out once more beneath the neglect of the past. This was how Chantries had been meant to look.

She planned to hold an Open Day for the village once the workmen had all gone. She had discussed it with the Warnes, and Joan had eagerly suggested that the event might be useful for fund-raising for the local school. 'These cuts in council spending have meant that the children are missing out on a lot of things. The school desperately needs a mini-bus, for instance, so that the children can be taken on outings to the nearest swimming pool...'

'Why don't they build their own swimming pool?' Oriel had suggested.

Joan had laughed grimly. 'My dear girl, what with? They're short of money for essentials, let alone such luxuries as a swimming pool.'

'Then I'll pay for one,' Oriel had said at once. 'And the Open Day can supply the funds for its upkeep. If I hold Open Days

once a month, that should bring in enough money to pay for the upkeep for a year.'

Joan had been speechless for a moment. 'Are you serious?''Of course. I want to be involved with the community.

Unless you think the villagers would be offended?'Joan had laughed. 'Offended? My dear, they'll be thrilled.'

Then she looked thoughtful. 'But you're right in a way. It would be best if we could involve them in the project somewhere.'

Oriel waited, smiling. She had already realised that Joan was a great organiser.

Joan nodded. 'I've got it! If you have this Open Day you could combine it with a Village Fete. The women could run stalls and sideshows in the grounds. That way they would be helping to raise the money and they wouldn't feel any resentment at all.'

Looking at the freshly painted doors and windows, the classic wallpapers chosen to look like the originals, Oriel smiled. Chantries would become a showplace for the area. She wanted to be part of the village, not an outsider. The Haggards were always an organic part of the Dale even when they were most hated as ruthless landowners. They were all born, married and buried here in Torby. The people knew them; they knew the people. Gossip about their doings provided the village with amusement before the advent of television. Loved or hated, admired or despised, the Haggards had always taken a leading role in the drama of life in the Dales.

She went up Primrose Bank next day to visit Ann Dervil and see Linnet. The autumn winds blew keenly over the hillsides, turning the becks into turbulent fast-running waterfalls, lashing the trees to and fro and tearing the dry,

brown leaves away, sending them flying along the valley roads below until they settled m crisp heaps in the hollows.

Grey-blue smoke drifted out of the chimneys at the house. When Oriel tapped on the front door, Ann appeared, wiping her wet hands on her enveloping apron.'I thought you'd be up,' she said flatly.

'May I see Linnet?' Oriel asked her. 'Don't you think I have a right to see her?'

Ann shrugged. 'What I think is neither here nor there. You'd best speak to her father.''Where is he?''Out along the ridge with t'sheep.'

Oriel glanced up the whale-backed, rolling hillside. The crag towered crookedly above the house with the grassy slope falling away behind it. 'Up there?'

'Aye.' Ann's accent was grimly amused. She ran an eye over Oriel's smart black trouser suit. 'You'll get them clothes mucky.'

Oriel's chin set defiantly. 'I'll go up and see him.''Aye,' Ann looked at her knowingly, 'I thought you would.'They stared at each other. Oriel's cheeks flushed and her

green eyes darkened. Ann knew about her and Devil; that much was certain. She had always known about the past, of course, but how much did she know about the present?

Abruptly, she asked her, 'Why did you ever get involved with my uncle in the first place? Did you love him?'

Ann's eyes were wry. 'Is it any business of yours?''No,' Oriel said. 'None. I'm sorry.' She turned away, but

Ann's voice spoke behind her evenly.'I were engaged to a shepherd when I was eighteen. A

careful, skimping chap, wanting to save enough to wed on, and

I saw little of him. His sheep had more sight of him than I did. Then I met Jerry out in the park down there—riding his horse, a big black thing like the one Devil rides now. Jerry stared at me and I stared back—it were that fast. The next thing I knew I was pregnant. I were desperate. Jerry had gone away up to London on business. I told my young man our wedding were off and why. He were black with anger, but he said nowt to me. Jerry came back and I went down to see 'im. He said vile things to me—seems my decent young man had been down afore me, told Jerry I'd been sleeping with him, too, and meant to lay my bairn at his door because he were the richer of the two. Jerry believed him, so I lost them both.'

Oriel was horrified. 'But why didn't you tell him the truth?'Ann's face was rigid with pride. 'If Jerry didn't know me

well enough to know it were all lies, then I wanted no more of him. I never married and nor did he.'

'Perhaps he loved you all the time,' Oriel said slowly.Ann's face did not alter. "I wouldn't be surprised,' she said

without emotion.Oriel stared. 'But... but that's monstrous ... to let pride stand

between you and happiness like that.'Ann shrugged indifferendy. 'Jerry and I wouldn't have

suited. I'm not cut out to play lady of the manor, and he would have been black ashamed of me. No, it were fate.'

She turned and went back to the house, shutting the door. Oriel slowly moved away, feeling chilled. She recognised in Ann the same pride she had seen in Devil. How far were they prepared to go, these Dervils? Were they always prepared to throw away their lives rather than sacrifice their pride?

- As she climbed above the house the wind took hold of her, pulling at her, whipping her hair into wild disorder, cutting through her clothes like a knife through butter. The clouds scudded overhead so fast it made her dizzy to look up at them. How close to heaven one was up here, with the great empty spaces of the universe stretching away above one, and the winds of the earth blowing, blowing to and fro.She saw Devil in a moment, moving with leisurely grace among the sheep, taking an ewe by the head and lifting it to inspect it, then letting it go with a pat and turning to look at another. He was wearing his oldest clothes; a clean white shirt and old breeches. His black hair blew back from his leonine head.Suddenly he caught sight of her and turned to stare. She came up to him, uneasy under that enigmatic gaze.'Well?' he demanded.'I want to get to know Linnet,' she said. 'Devil, she's my cousin's child. I have a right...''How many times do I have to tell you, you have no rights here, Mrs Mellstock.' , 'Devil, please,' she pleaded.He moved closer. 'Are you begging, Mrs Mellstock?'She drew a sharp breath. 'For God's sake!'His dark face was unmoved. 'Are you begging?''Yes,' she whispered, beaten. 'If I must.''You must,' he said coolly. 'I told you, in future you and I will only deal on those terms.''Then please let me see the child.'His blue eyes flashed in triumph. 'Very well. You can come up here once a week to visit her.'Oriel felt her muscles sag in relief. 'And may I take her down to see Chantries now and then?'

The black brows jerked together. 'No. You comehere. She doesn't go down there.'

She knew better than to continue the argument. For the moment she had won a limited victory. She thought of Ann Dervil's pride and the burnt offering she had made to it in the past. She would not make any burnt offerings to her pride. If Devil insisted that she come up here to see Linnet, she would come. Linnet would need more love and sympathy than she would ever get from this stark, unbending man.

She half turned to go, but halted, not quite knowing how to leave him.'Something else?' he asked curtly.

'I'm having an Open Day at Chantries when it's finished. Will you come and bring your mother and Linnet?'

'You've asked the whole village, I hear,' he said.She nodded. 'Yes, the idea was for them to see what I've

done to the house.''You wanted to show off what your money had bought,' he

said sardonically.'No!' She felt her cheeks redden. 'I wanted to share

Chantries with them.''You want them to admire you and your money, the

fertiliser which has given that monstrous house new life,' he said bitterly.

'Very well,' she said, her temper rising. 'Don't damned well come, then.'

'Don't fret,' he said harshly. 'I had no intention of coming. No Lady Bountiful is handing me an invitation to come and kneel in worship before her all- powerful money.'

'They say the Haggards are proud,' she flung angrily, 'but the Dervils have us beat by a mile!''Aye, we've our pride. We know when we're being patronised. Did you really think my mother and I would come on Haggard land with the rest like serfs visiting their master? Think again, Oriel Mellstock.''You come on to Haggard land to poach often enough,' she said.His white teeth broke in a smile. 'Aye, and I will in future.''If I don't shoot you first'He moved closer to stare down at her in challenge. 'I've told you once before—I'd like that. Shall I whistle at nights so as to give you a fair chance of hitting me?''I don't understand you,' she said furiously.'Then, by God, you'll have to learn,' he retorted.'Perhaps I don't want to learn!'He shrugged. 'It's a free country.'Her palms itched to slap that mocking face. He saw fingers curl at her sides and grinned.'Don't try it, Mrs Mellstock. It would give me great pleasure to hit you back, remember.'She remembered, her face flooded with rich colour. 'You ... you great brute!' She turned and ran, slipping on the damp grass, and he laughed, watching her with amusement until she was out of sight.

That night as Oriel lay in bed in the lodge she heard him whistle outside her window. Her temper flaring, she leapt out of bed, thrust herself into a pink wool dressing-gown and grabbed a shotgun from the cupboard where she now kept it.

There was a moon, a thin lemon-quarter silvery moon, sailing gently through the clouds, shedding a faint silvery light over the darkness in the park.

Devil whistled again as she opened the front door and stood there, staring around. He had moved off into the trees. Oriel stared angrily in the direction from which the last noise had come, but then swivelled as the whistle came from much further to the left. Really angry now, she whipped up the shotgun and shot in that direction. The blast made her jump, and for a moment she was deafened. Then she heard that maddening whistle again, from the right.

'Damn you to hell, Devil Haggard!' she shouted, turning to go back into the Lodge.

Mocking laughter drifted back to her as she slammed the front door.

She irritably took off her dressing-gown and got back into bed. He could whistle out there all night in future. She wasn't playing silly games with him.

Her last thought, as she sank into deam-tortured sleep, was that he would catch pneumonia out there, and serve him right.

Next morning Joan Warne invited her to lunch. Phil was late back from his rounds. He had to drive for miles sometimes, his practice extending as it did over the whole Dale, and he often snatched a meal at someone's house. They were very hospitable folk in this part of the world.

'I think we'd better start without him,' said Joan. 'He's probably eating somewhere else.''Where are the children?' asked Oriel, looking out into the garden.

'At school, my dear. They have their meals there at lunchtime. Of course, they could just about come home, but their friends all stay and they hate to be different.'Thinking of Anatole, Oriel nodded. 'I know. My son tells me I'm the wrong shape for a mother.'Joan laughed. 'The wrong shape? What does he mean?''Apparently mothers shouldn't be slim and quite young, they should be middle-aged and rather dumpy. He's ashamed of me.''Aren't they devils? Why do we have them?' Joan ladled thick golden vegetable soup into the soup plates. 'There. Home-made and very nourishing.''Goodness I' Oriel exclaimed, tasting it. 'You are a good cook.''Thank you. Don't forget to repeat that remark to Phil, will you?' Joan said cheerfully.Oriel laughed. 'I'm sure he knows already.''It never does any harm to remind a man how valuable you are,' said Joan. Then she glanced at Oriel. 'I had an ulterior modve in asking you here today.''What was that?''Well, you've been marvellous about the swimming pool and the Open Days at Chantries, and I wondered if you were prepared to take any part in local organisations.'Oriel studied her nervously. 'What sort of part?'Joan looked at her pleadingly. 'Committee work,' she said. 'Oh, I know it's deadly dull and a lot of hard work, but someone has to do it, and very few people are prepared to help."

Oriel laughed. 'Well, I'm pretty busy with the house at the moment, but if you really need help with one of your committees I'd have a shot at it.'

Joan looked radiant. 'That's terrific I What do you prefer? Charity work? Church work? Or the local council?'

'Good lord,' said Oriel. 'Not local government in any shape or form. I think charity work ...'

'Marvellous,' Joan beamed. 'But if I were you I would consider entering politics at local level. The District Council needs new blood, and in your position at Chantries, you would be very welcome, you know.''It sounds so dull,' Oriel sighed.

'It has to be done,' Joan shrugged. She removed the soup plates and began to serve lamb chops with rice and peppers and tomatoes. 'Do you remember old Joe Murgatroyd who lives at Burwash House, on the far side of the Dale?' she asked.Oriel considered. 'I think I do, vaguely.'

'He was telling me about the wonderful balls they used to have at Chantries when he was young. They used the great saloon, he said, and there were chandeliers and damask curtains and footmen ... he waxed quite lyrical on the subject.'

Oriel smiled. 'Yes, I've heard about them, too.' Her eyes lit up. 'I might have one.'

Joan looked thrilled. 'A ball? Really? Oh, Oriel, what a fund-raiser that would be!'Oriel laughed. 'No, not for fund-raising, Joan. Just to make the acquaintance of the local people.'Joan looked doubtful. 'I don't see Hezekiah or Ena dancing at a ball at Chantries.''Not the villagers,' Oriel disclaimed. 'They would be too embarrassed. No, I meant people like Mr Murgatroyd and his granddaughters. They're my age, aren't they?''Oh, I could help to draw up a guest list,' Joan said eagerly.

'You do that,' Oriel nodded. 'Won't it be fun?'Joan's eyes were starry. 'Wonderful fun! I know a local band who would play for you.'Oriel thought about it. 'No, I shall do this in the old style. I'll bring a really professional band down from London, and London caterers, too, I think. Let me see ... Christmas would be a good time for a ball. How about that?''Lovely,' Joan agreed. 'Or New Year's Eve...''New Year's Eve,' Oriel exclaimed. 'Perfect timing! Yes, we shall have a New Year Ball at Chantries.'Joan laid down her fork, her lamb chops forgotten. 'That doesn't leave us much time for the arrangements, of course.''You think it will be impossible?''Nothing is impossible,' smiled Joan.Over the crème caramel which ended the meal, they talked excitedly about the arrangements which would have to be made, and then drew up a list of which of them would be responsible for what, then- faces so intent that they did not hear Phil's arrival.

'By the pricking of my thumbs,' he teased, leaning through the door, 'you two are up to something.'

They both tried to tell him at once, then laughed. 'You go ahead,' Oriel told Joan, who, nothing daunted, burst into hot speech once more.

'My word,' said Phil, 'this is going to make the gossips hum with excitement. Joan, my love, you're going to be number one blue-eyed girl for the next few months.'Joan looked puzzled. 'How do you mean?'

'Oriel has given you the job of making the list of guests, you said.'

Joan nodded. 'That's right. Well, I know everybody for miles around, don't I? What with my church work, my charity work, my ...'

'Yes, love, we know you single-handedly run the whole of this Riding,' he said drily. 'Well, now you're in the position of saying yea or nay to the great sixty-four dollar question: who will be on that guest list? Now,, since everybody will want to come, they're all going to be very nice to you until the invitations go out.' He grinned. 'Now's your chance to persuade Colonel Yates to have his hedges cut down low enough to improve the sight lines on the Upper Tor Road, not to mention your chance to get your own back on Edna Burrows for snubbing you at the gymkhana last summer.'

Oriel shrieked with laughter. 'And I thought London was a snakepit! London is obviously a nursery school compared to Torby.'

Phil winked at her. 'Joan has ambitions which wouldn't have disgraced Julius Caesar, only her dream of conquest extends only to the District Council.'

'Oh, shut up,' said Joan, going red. 'He's such a dreadful tease, Oriel. Ignore him.'

As she drove back to Chantries, Oriel envied them their warm and secure relationship. They were very nice people, Joan and Phil. Their marriage was happy and untroubled. Leaving the halcyon safety of their home to return to her own empty habitation made her feel lost and afraid.

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE first time Oriel visited Devil's Leap to see Linnet she found the child sitting patiently on the grass outside the house waiting for Jessica to take her for a walk. Linnet was warmly dressed in cherry red slacks and a matching knitted zipped sweater with a hood. She looked surprised and curious as Oriel looked down at her with a smile.'Remember me?'Linnet nodded shyly. 'You came one day.''I'm your cousin Oriel.'

Linnet looked at her from below her thick lashes. 'I know.'Oriel paused. 'Did your father tell you I would come to visit you once a week?''No,' said a sharply hostile voice. 'I told her.'

Oriel swung to find Jessica watching her with narrowed eyes. Jessica was clearly in a temper—the spots of red in her cheeks betrayed that.

Oriel nodded. 'Hallo.' Without meaning to, her voice came out coolly, with an inbred hauteur which her fine-boned, pale face emphasised, and Jessica reacted with anger.

'Yes, I told Linnet that her mother's cousin wanted to steal her away from her own home and take her away from her father. I told her nothing but the truth, because she's old enough to understand that it was because of the way her rich relations treated her that her mother got ill and died, Kids can stand the truth. They can't stand lies and evasions and hypocrisy.'

'Clare died because she was sick,' Oriel said gently, looking at Linnet. 'I was fond of your mother. I'm fond of you, Linnet...'

'You're fonder of her father,' Jessica said savagely.Oriel went white. She bit her lip and clenched her fists at

her sides. At all costs she must refrain from losing her temper in

front of the child. Quietly, she said, 'Run and find your grandmother, will you, Linnet, and tell her I'm here and want to speak to her?'

Jessica grabbed at the child as she darted away, but Linnet evaded her grip and was gone.

Jessica looked furiously at Oriel. 'Clever, aren't you?''You had no business talking like that in front of a child,'

Oriel said icily.'Oh, of course you don't want her to know the truth,' Jessica

snapped. 'You and that precious father of hers! One day she'll have to find out that he's the biggest womaniser this side of the Border, and they all fall for those blue eyes of his.'Oriel turned away without answering.

'He only wants you so he can get his hands on your house, you know,' Jessica went on mercilessly. 'That's all he ever wanted. He married her for it, now he'll marry you. But if I had it he would prefer me, don't think he wouldn't.' She panted with fury and jealousy as she spoke, her face contorted. 'You haven't seen the way he looks at me. I know when a man wants me ... he wants me, he wants me, not you...'

'What's going on out here?' Ann Dervil came out of the house with a stern face.

Jessica turned on her hysterically. 'You know! Tell her the truth! You've seen him kiss me, last week he kissed me. Tell her the truth!'

Ann slapped her face once, hard. 'You're talking wild nonsense, girl. Stop it!'

Jessica burst into tears. 'Oh, you back him up, of course. You tried to marry Chantries, too, didn't you, but that wicked old man told you to get lost, and you were landed with an

unnamed baby. You put the idea into his head, taught him to look down there and want the house more than anything else...'

'I'll teach you to hold your tongue,' Ann said fiercely. 'How dare you talk to me like that? Get off my land, you vile-tongued little hussy 1'

Jessica gasped with sudden shock. She stared, red-eyed, at Ann. Then she tossed her head. 'I'll go when he tells me to, not before. He asked me to stay on after his wife died. He pays my wages, not you.'

'When I tell him that you've been poisoning his child against him, you'll be lucky to walk down Devil's Leap instead of being flung down.' Ann spoke harshly, glaring at the girl.

Jessica fled, sobbing. Oriel felt sick. She turned away very slowly. She only wanted to get away from here.

Behind her, Ann said quietly, 'Linnet's waiting for you in the house. She's in her own little bedroom. I told her you'd come up.''Will she want to see me now?' Oriel asked miserably. 'I remember how much I hated grown-up rows when I was small. They made me squirm with embarrassment.''Aye, Linnet's the same, but you have to start some time. She is expecting you.'Oriel drew a deep breath. 'Yes, all-right.'She went into the house she remembered so well and found the small bedroom which had once been Devil's—the window looking out upon the crag and the whale-backed rolling hillside. It was a grim landscape on winter days, but on summer days it had been full of colour and delight.Linnet was crouching on the floor hugging a battered doll to her chest.

Oriel came quietly into the room and looked at her. 'May I come in?'Linnet did not look up, just nodded dumbly.'May I sit down?' Oriel asked gently.Linnet nodded.Oriel sat down on the edge of the bed. 'Do you like sleeping in this room?' she asked.Linnet looked at the window, her eyes wide and thoughtful. Oriel smiled, seeing the flash of eyes so like Devil's.'Your father slept in here. He liked to wake up in the early morning when the birds started singing and lie looking up at the sky watching them fly backwards and forwards out there.'Linnet said huskily, 'That's what I do.' She looked round in astonishment. 'He never told me that.''Maybe he forgot,' said Oriel. 'People do forget important things when they grow up.''Did you live here?' asked the child.'No, I lived at Chantries.'Linnet's face clouded over at once, and Oriel inwardly cursed Jessica for the malice with which she had poisoned the child's mind. It would be best now to be absolutely frank about the past.Gently, she said, 'Your mother and I lived there together for a while. We were cousins, and friends, until she got married.'Linnet peeped at her from beneath her lashes. She waited. 'Why didn't you go on living here?' she asked.'I went to Africa, a country a long way away from England,' Oriel explained.'Why?''My father lived there and I wanted to be with him.'

Linnet stared at her. 'Where is your father now?''He died,' Oriel told her.'My mother died,' Linnet burst out.'I know. I was very sorry.''Jessica says you wanted her to die.''That isn't true. I didn't want her to die. I tried to help her, but she was too sick.'Linnet nodded. 'I know she was sick. She was always sick.' She took a sharp breath. 'Was she sick because of me?'Oriel stared down at the little white face, the blue eyes filled with a nameless apprehension. 'Because ofyou, my dear? Of course not. Did Jessica say that?'

Linnet shook her head. 'Mother did. Once when she was very ... very sick. She said she'd got sick when I was born, that it was all my fault...'

Oriel crouched to take her in her arms, pulling the dark head down against her shoulder. 'Oh, Linnet, your mother was too ill to know what she was saying. She loved you dearly, dearly. She didn't mean it. It was nothing to do with you at all, nothing. I swear that to you on my honour ..

Linnet lay against her limply, then with a pathetic little gesture of comfort put her thumb into her mouth and rocked herself gently to and fro on Oriel's shoulder. Oriel lifted her into her arms and sat down on the bed with the child close to her on her lap.'Shall I tell you a story?'

Linnet nodded without speaking. She was sucking vigorously at her thumb.

Softly, Oriel told her a fairy story about a little girl and a magic hat. Linnet became so engrossed in it that she laughed

and her thumb fell out without her noticing. When the story ended, she clamoured for more. Oriel improvised with another funny story about a fat baker and a goose.'Time for tea,' Ann Dervil said from the door.

Linnet climbed down from Oriel's lap and went over to her grandmother, seizing her hand. 'Oriel told me a funny story ...'

'You can tell it to me while we have tea,' Ann smiled. 'I like a good story.'

Linnet skipped down the stairs chattering cheer- fully. They had tea together in the kitchen, which was filled with the cosy warmth of the old range. Oriel watched with awed amusement as Linnet ate her way through buttered drop scones, sandwiches and seedy cake, chattering all the time.

'She's not usually so chatty,' Ann said gruffly. "You've done her good.'

Linnet and Ann walked to the gate with her to say goodbye. Oriel kissed Linnet and promised to be back the following week.'I'll come once a week, I promise.'

'Can't you come every day?' Linnet asked eagerly.'I wish I could,' said Oriel.

'I'll ask my Daddy. He lets me do anything,' Linnet boasted.Ann looked drily at Oriel. 'That's true enough.'Oriel smiled and said goodbye. Looking back as she

reached the road, she saw Devil's lean figure emerging from the house. Had he been there all the time? Or had he just come in from the fields? He made no movement of greeting towards her and she made none to him.

The following week she climbed Primrose Bank again. Linnet was waiting impatiently for her, dancing up and down in

the garden. They walked for a while together, finding the last sprigs of heather and looking out for birds feeding on the autumn berries. 'Jessica's gone for good,' Linnet confided. 'Daddy shouted at her. He was cross.'

Oriel changed the subject. 'There'll be the fair coming to the Upper Tor Road soon. Shall you go?'

Linnet was easily distracted by this fascinating subject. 'A fair?' she cried excitedly. 'Oh, when? Oh, I want to go!'

'Perhaps your daddy will let me take you,' Oriel suggested.Linnet's eyes shone. 'Will you? Can I have rides? Can I have

candy-floss and a hot dog?'She was still enthralled by the idea when they returned to

the house. She talked of nothing else throughout tea. Ann said grimly, 'I warrant you Devil will be vexed by all this talk of fairs.''He used to love fairs,' Oriel said.

'What? When he were a boy, maybe, but it's many the long year since those days ...'

Oriel left at the usual time, and, as she looked back from the road far below, again saw Devil staring down at her. She walked away with some amusement. Was this a game he was playing? Or was he merely showing her that he intended to keep the oath he had sworn, that he meant to keep her at a distance from now on?

The fair came to the Upper Tor Road next week. Oriel walked up to Devil's Leap to see if she would be allowed to take Linnet. When she got there, Ann looked doubtful. 'I admit, Devil didn't say no, but he didn't say yes, either.''She did ask him?'

Ann grinned. 'Every blessed time she saw him. Aye, she asked. And he hedged. I don't know what to say.''Is he around now?' 'No,' said Ann. 'He's off out.'

'Then I shall take her,' Oriel decided. 'Let him shout about it later.'

Ann made a face. 'Rather you than me. He's a hard lad to cross, my Devil.'

Linnet's glowing, shining excitement was sufficient reward for the faint alarm Oriel felt about risking Devil's rage. They found their way to the fair and as soon as she saw it Linnet grew white with joy, her blue eyes so bright they illuminated her whole face. She had a ride on everything, munched her way through popcorn, hot dogs and candy-floss, tried to shoot at a metal target, threw balls at coconuts and fished up plastic ducks from the water. Loaded down with cheap gimcrack toys, they were about to leave when they met Devil on the edge of the fair.

Oriel's heart thudded at the look on his face. Linnet ran to him, babbling joyfully. 'Look, Daddy, look!' She burst into a torrent of excited speech.

He listened, watching her. 'Aye, I can see you've had a great time. Here, my lamb, have another go on the miniature railway ...'

Enchanted, she pushed all her souvenirs at Oriel. 'Hold them for me, Auntie ..

They stood and watched her climb aboard the train. It chuffed away. Devil slowly turned his head. His blue eyes were as vicious and as blindingly bright as lightning.

'So,' he said, between his teeth. 'You took her without my permission, did you?''She would have been so disappointed!'

'It never occurred to you that I might be planning to take her myself?''Oh I' She went pale. 'No, I'm sorry, Devil.''Sorry?' His teeth clamped together. 'You'll be sorry, my lady. This is the last piece of interference I'll stand for from you. You'll not see my daughter again.'Oriel was dazed. 'You can't mean that!''Watch me!''But, Devil, I've got so fond of her, and I think she's fond of me 1'At that moment Linnet rushed back to them. 'Did you see me, Daddy? You didn't wave. Didn't you see me waving?' She looked up at Oriel, her eyes aglow. 'Oh, Auntie Oriel, I do love you!' She Hung her arms around Oriel's waist and hugged her.Over the child's dark head the two adults surveyed each other silently. Devil's face was black with rage.'Don't you love her, Daddy?' Linnet babbled on. 'Isn't she the sweetest person you ever met?''Oh, the sweetest,' he said with a savage inflection, his eyes burning at Oriel.'I've got my car parked up the road,' Oriel said nervously. 'Can I give you a lift back?''No, thank you,' said Devil. 'I came in the Land- rover. We'll go back the same way.'They parted in the outer darkness. As Oriel drove away she heard the blaring fairground music filling the night like a mocking commentary on what had happened. Would Devil insist on excluding her from the house in future? she wondered. Or wouldhe relent in the face of Linnet's affection for her?

When she went to Devil's Leap the next week she was taut with nervous dread, but Linnet was waiting, as usual, and Ann prepared tea without commenting. Clearly, Devil had relented. The relief of it made her happy all that week.

The weather was worsening now that winter had definitely arrived in the Dales. Snow began to fall lightly at the end of November, and Oriel had to decide whether to hold her Open Day that year or wait until spring, when the weather would be more suitable. She had now moved into Chantries, which was clear of all workmen, and she was expecting Renée and Anatole to join her for Christmas there. Mr Weedon was going to drive Anatole to London for a few days first; Oriel knew that Renée wanted to have the boy all to herself for a while.

Joan agreed that it would not be sensible to hold the Open Day in such appalling weather. 'It will take so long to build the school swimming pool, anyway.'

Oriel had already donated her cheque to the school fund, and the excited school board were at this moment considering which builder to employ.

The arrangements for the ball, however, were going ahead, and Oriel found they took up quite a bit of her time. She and Joan spent hours discussing the catering arrangements, the guest list, the music.

A number of Oriel's London acquaintances were to be invited for Renée's sake, since Renée knew them rather better than Oriel did, and gossip about the ball had reached them via the press, who were taking a great interest in the occasion.

Oriel would have a crowded house for the weekend in question, since the London people would have to be invited to stay the night. Mr Weedon would be there to help, of course.

Oriel had now engaged a cheerful Spanish couple to run Chantries for her with the aid of several of the village women, who came in daily to do the heavy housework.

Hezekiah's grandson Zeke had agreed to take over the gardens and grounds, aided by his two schoolboy brothers at weekends. They worked for pocket money, but one of them had a decided flair for gardening, and had already asked Oriel if he might join the staff permanently when he left school. The other boy wanted to be a vet. He liked to look after the two horses Oriel had bought—a quiet grey mare for herself and a well-schooled little pony for Anatole. Oriel encouraged the two boys to ride the horses in the mornings since they loved to do this and it gave the horses necessary exercise.

As the weather grew worse, it made her weekly visit to Devil's Leap something of an ordeal, but since Devil would not permit Linnet to come down to Chantries to stay for a while, Oriel was forced either to make the long climb or stop seeing the child, and by now she knew that it would not only wound Linnet deeply but wound her own feelings if she did not see the child.

Two weeks before Christmas, she made the climb as usual, on a bleak winter afternoon with the sky hanging heavily above Devil's Leap, pregnant with unshed snow. The air was bitterly still. The birds were silent. The air was, indeed, hushed with waiting.

She came into the kitchen, shivering. Ann had a cup of hot tea waiting. 'My word, you look blue I It's nearly time for this to stop.'

'I can't let Linnet down,' said Oriel, gripping the cup between both frozen hands. The warmth percolated inside her.

She sat down, laughing. 'I feel like a kettle about to boil I' After the bitter cold of the outside world the heat of the kitchen brought a bright red glow to her cheeks. She took off her fur- lined anorak and her thick top sweater and sipped her tea appreciatively.

Linnet came to sit on her lap, her arms wound around her neck. 'What will we do if it snows a lot?' she asked unhappily. 'You won't be able to get up here?''We'll think of something,' Oriel promised her.

Ann was staring out of the window. 'There, here it comes 1 I just saw a flake go by ...'

Drawn by the enchantment of the snow, they all stood at the window and watched the crystalline flakes thicken until they whirled in a driving blizzard.'You ought to be on your way,' Ann warned.

'Oh, no, not yet,' Linnet cried desperately, clinging.Oriel said, 'I'll tell you the story of the Snow Queen, then I

must go.'While she told the old story, Ann went out to cover the

rabbit cages and make sure the dogs were locked up out of harm's way. Oriel was halfway through the tale of the Snow Queen when she heard a cry outside and a crash.

They ran out. Ann lay on the snowy path, one leg twisted under her ominously. She moaned with pain as they raised her. Her leg was obviously broken.

'I'll go and get the doctor,' Oriel said at once, but as she was zipping up her anorak Devil strode in and looked at Ann in surprise.

'I've broken my leg,' his mother told him curtly, her voice harsh with controlled pain.

'I'll take you down to the hospital,' he said at once. He glanced at Oriel. 'Will you stay with Linnet? I'll ring your house and tell them where you are.'

She nodded, and he bent down and lifted his mother into his arms. She bit her lip but made no sound of protest. Devil looked down at her, 'Can you manage?'

She nodded. 'Get on with it, and don't chat so much.'He grinned, 'You evil-tempered old woman 1' Gently he

carried her out to his Land-rover. They heard the vehicle start up. The journey down the back lanes would be an agonising affair for Ann, thought Oriel unhappily. Linnet looked very pale.'Will my grandmother die?' she burst out.

Realising that to the child's mind a visit to hospital had now become as dangerous as stepping into a lion's cage, Oriel hastily explained that Ann wouldbe fine as soon as the doctors had mended her leg.

She managed to soothe Linnet for the present, but the child refused to go to bed until her father had returned with news of Ann.

He arrived back two hours later, and raised a brow at the sight of Linnet sitting there in her , thick pyjamas and dressing-gown, her pink slippers dangling from her seat on Oriel's lap. But he reassured the child easily, and Linnet went off to bed with Oriel happily enough after that.

When Oriel got back downstairs she found Devil idly reading a newspaper by the sitting-room fire. She stood in the doorway, looking at him uneasily, wondering what was going to happen now. Should she offer to stay the night? Would he bite

her head off? How could he possibly cope with the house and Linnet?

Without looking up he said roughly, 'Well, woman, where's my supper?'She stared dumbfounded.

He looked round, then, his blue eyes bright with mockery. 'Get on with it. I'm waiting. I've been out in t'fields all day, and I'm fair ravening.'

Without a word, she went into the kitchen and investigated. She found a cottage pie keeping warm in the side oven of the range. She cooked some tomatoes and peas and called to him to come and eat.

'Bring it here, woman,' he called back without stirring.Her cheeks flushed with anger, Oriel placed the food on a

tray and carried it through to him. He glanced up slyly as she placed the tray on his lap. Suddenly the old charm shone through in that sidelong, teasing look, and her heart turned over. You devil, she thought, don't think you can get round me that easily. I'm not seventeen any more. I'm immune to that come-hither smile of yours.'Well, I'll be going now,' she said tardy.

He forked some food into his mouth without concern. 'You'll not get down Primrose Bank in this snow,' he said.'I've done it before,' she said.'In the dark?'

She looked at the window. It was already night. An owl cried somewhere in the melancholy dark.'The snow will light the path,' she said.

Devil gave a bark of laughter. 'Rubbish, woman. Eat your supper and shut up.'

Oriel glared at him. 'Will you stop ordering me around as if I were a servant?'

He finished his meal before answering. 'That's better,' he said, handing her the tray. 'I'll have a cup of coffee now.'

'Oh I' she seethed, stamping back into the kitchen. When she had made the coffee she took it back to him. He was lying back in his chair, his eyes closed, toasting his feet at the fire. The lamp was shedding a soft light over his face, carving strange hollows in his cheeks and emphasising the power of his jaw and mouth.

'My mother will be laid up for a good while,' he said. 'I shall need help around the house. I can'ttend to my sheep and the house at the same time."'I'll find you someone in the village.' she said.

He looked up at her. 'You'll do it yourself,' he told her commandingly.

'Who do you think you are?' she burst out. 'How dare you tell me...'

'Linnet will stand for no one else,' he interrupted flatly. 'You know that.'Oriel stared at him. It was damnably true.

Devil stretched his legs with a contented sigh. 'You make good coffee.' Then he looked at her sharply. 'You've no one but yourself to blame. You've made yourself necessary to the child, now she'll have no one but you.'

She flushed, the compliment overwhelming her.He went on in the same sharp tone, 'You're like bindweed.

You twine yourself around the very heartstrings and will not be torn out— a clever trick to play on folk, but sometimes you have to pay for being so damned clever. So get on and do the

washing up before you get off to bed. We keep early hours here. Up with the birds and to sleep as soon as it's dark.'

'You could have asked me with a pretence of courtesy, however,' she protested. 'Not just ordered me to stay.'

He stood up, yawning, and the movement caught her unawares. She found her mouth going dry with sudden hunger as she watched him stretch his arms and yawn.

He looked at her laconically. 'You've obviously forgotten what I said to you a while back. I begged once, woman, but I'll never beg again. From now on, any begging comes from you. You can go or stay, as you please. You're free. But Linnet needs you, so make your choice.'

'Damn you, Devil Haggard,' she said in a low, shaking voice. He smiled suddenly, the charm back in his handsome face.

'I learnt a long while back that some animals need to be whipped into submission and only despise you if you treat them gently. You're one of those, Oriel. You have nothing but scorn for any weakness in a man, have you? You only respond to violence.'

'I wish I'd shot you when you came night-whistling round my house,' she said bitterly.

He laughed loudly and left the room. She heard his footsteps on the stairs. Wearily she tidied up, banked up the fire and went into the kitchen to do the washing up. When the kitchen was tidy she put out the lights and went upstairs to bed. Devil met her on the landing.

In low tones he said, "You can have Clare's room. Here's one of her nighties.'

Oriel shivered. 'I would rather not. Can't I use the spare room?''In the attic? It's freezing up there.''I would rather,' she insisted.

He grimaced. 'It's your funeral if you do. I suppose you won't want to wear Clare's things, either? Hang on ...' He vanished and came back with a flame red nylon nightie trimmed with lace. Oriel's brows rose at the sight of it. He grinned wickedly.

'Jessica left this behind. Dazzling, isn't it? She looked pretty dazzling in it, too.'

'I've no doubt,' she said drily, sick with intolerable jealousy. She nodded. 'Goodnight.'

He vanished down the stairs again, and she slipped into the bathroom to wash and clean her teeth. Then she went up to the attic room and changed into her borrowed nightgear. The little room was bitterly cold. There was just a narrow bed, a wash- stand with a Victorian flowered bowl on it, and a broken cane-seated chair. The curtains shut out the night, but not the wind which came roaring through the room with a sound like a train.

Oriel put out the light and slid into the chilly bed. There was no warm spot anywhere. It was like sleeping in an ice-field. Suddenly a tap on the door, then it opened and Devil looked at her through the darkness.

'What do you want?' she demanded in a shaky voice.'I've brought you a hot water bottle,' he said grimly. He

came across and handed it to her.She was shamed. 'Oh ... thank you.' It had been thoughtful

of him and her immediate suspicions had been unjustified.

He stood, very dark and large, staring down through the darkness at her. Her heart began to thud violently against her breast.

'By God,' he said thickly, 'I don't know how I'm going to get out of this room.''Devil,' she whispered hoarsely.

'Oh, go to sleep!' he snarled, and stamped out, slamming the door after him.

CHAPTER NINE

DEVIL brought her a cup of tea next morning before first light. She was fast asleep, curled like a child under the blankets, her hair spread out upon the pillow. Devil put the tea down and bent over her, one finger gently caressing her cheek.'Wake up, Rapunzel.'

Oriel lay still, her lashes fluttering, then opened her eyes and looked up at him, tense as a coiled spring. He grinned.

'I'm just off out—I've got to pay t'wages today at my other farms. I'll be back tonight. There's plenty of meat in the freezer, but Linnet will be just as pleased with fish fingers, I daresay.' His blue eyes mocked her. 'You can cook fish fingers, can't ye?'

'I can do anything I have to do,' she returned calmly.'Aye,' he nodded, 'That's true enough. We can all do what

we have to do. Drink your tea before it's stone cold. I've left the fire in for you, built it up the back of the chimney. The snow's waist-deep down the Banks. The road will be blocked, I shouldn't wonder.'

She nodded. 'What about your mother? Will you visit her today?'

'I shall if I can get there,' he shrugged. 'We shall have to see how the weather goes on, shan't we?'

Oriel lay, waiting for him to leave, her fingers tense on the top of the sheet. Devil looked down at her enigmatically, then gave a curt nod. 'Well, I'm off, then..

When he had gone she sat up and sipped her tea, watching the curious cold light the snow threw over the room, listening to the uncanny silence. The snow muffled everything, wrapping the trees and bushes in elegant white mink wraps so that they looked like society hostesses at a party, turning the ugliness of outbuildings into crystal caves, hanging glittering diamonds of ice upon drainpipes and eaves. The birds sat watchfully, huddling beneath their wings in nooks and crannies of the farm. The sky was still that ominous leaden colour. More snow to come, Oriel judged, as she dressed hastily in her sweater and thick slacks.

It was fun to move around the kitchen preparing Linnet's breakfast. She squeezed some oranges and chilled the juice while she boiled eggs and made tea. She had already called Linnet, who was splashing hastily in the bathroom.

Just as the eggs were ready, Linnet burst into the room with a bright, morning face. 'Oh, Auntie 1 I'm so glad you're staying here to look after me. I was afraid that horrid Jessica would come back.'

'Sit down and drink your orange juice,' Oriel said without comment on Linnet's statement, but her smile was warm and loving. She felt as tender towards this child born of Devil's marriage to Clare as she had ever felt towards her own son. Perhaps because Linnet looked so like her father, it was easy to love her. Anatole's transition from child to schoolboy had left

Oriel without a role to play. Chantries had been her answer, but it had not satisfied the need in her to be necessary to somebody. Linnet filled that gap.

After breakfast, she settled Linnet down with crayons and paper while she began to do some housework. When the kitchen was tidy and the lunch prepared, she went upstairs to make the beds. It was with some hesitation that she glanced into Devil's bedroom. He had, however, made his bed and left the room spotless. Drawn into the room by the spell of his possession of it, she stood beside the neatly made bed and laid one hand on the pillows. Her heart turned over at the thought of that dark head laid here in the abandonment of sleep, temporarily vulnerable. She looked at herself in his mirror and made a disgusted face. Was she totally lost to all self- respect to find pleasure in merely standing here in his room? She admitted crossly to herself that she was imagining how it would be if she were his wife, sharing this bedroom, sleeping in his bed, with their child downstairs by the fire playing happily.

She hurriedly went out, closing the door with a bang, as if shutting her mind to all such thoughts.

Outside Clare's empty room she stood for a moment, reluctant, yet forced to see it once more. At some time she had to come to terms with the memories Clare had left behind. She could not let Clare haunt the back of her mind for ever. Last night, confronted with the suggestion that she sleep there, she had reacted with an instinctive alarm that she recognised as pure superstitious terror. She felt guilt towards Clare. Guilt because she loved Clare's husband. Guilt because Clare's husband had never loved Clare.

Slowly she pushed the door open and looked around the room. It was very tidy, very cold, very empty.

Clare's unhappiness in this house seemed to hang over the room like a pall. How many hours of misery had her cousin suffered here?

She opened the wardrobe. All Clare's clothes hung there. An odour of mothballs rose from them. About to close the door again, she saw a box she recognised on a shelf in the wardrobe, and paused, staring at it. The box was of carved ivory, very rare and very beautiful. It had belonged to Uncle Jeremiah's mother—a present, so legend had it, from an Indian prince during her honeymoon tour of India. As children they had loved to play with it, tracing the carvings of elephants and tigers with their fingers.

She took it down and gently stroked the carvings, remembering vanished moments of happiness. The lid was slightly crooked and the hinge appeared to be broken. Oriel lifted the lid idly, and saw a small diary inside. Clare's?

Looking at the date, she was astonished to find that this was Clare's diary for the year in which she married Egon, the year in which Clare had married Devil. Why had Clare kept it in this box, like a treasure hidden away from prying eyes?

She hesitated, momentarily, then opened the book. Clare was dead now. It could not hurt her if she read these pages, and it might at last reveal what had really happened between Clare and Devil. She had to know whether Clare had told the truth, or whether Devil had, as he had claimed, been tricked into marrying Clare. Which of them was she to believe? She had to know.

She sank down on the bed and began to read. Her face grew pale, her eyes widened as the words sank home to her. She read steadily the whole saga of those vanished months.

When she had closed the book she put it back into the ivory box and took the box into Devil's room, placing it prominently on his dressing-table, where he would see it at once, and know that she had read it. She could not bring herself to speak to him directly on the subject. She could guess why Clare had kept this one diary, why she had left it enshrined in the ivory box where Devil would one day find it. In an oblique way Clare had been trying to make the truth manifest, to make some sort of amends for the past.

The day passed peacefully and happily. Linnet was fast asleep in bed when Devil got home. Oriel had a lamb stew gently cooking in the range oven for him, and served it to him at the kitchen table. He sat there in his rolled-up shirt-sleeves, his face freshly scrubbed and towelled, glowing with health after his day in the bitter cold countryside. She sat opposite him, pouring tea and passing fresh-baked rolls.He grinned at her. 'Trying to impress me?'

'I learnt to bake bread when I was a girl, remember? Clare and I used to have lessons in the kitchen at Chantries from old Mrs Block. She was a stickler for the right and wrong ways of baking bread.'

'Not bad,' he commented, biting into a roll. 'The stew's good, too. I saw my mother. She's already back to normal, apart from her leg, and they say she can come home soon. They want her to get back on her feet as soon as possible.'

She nodded. 'Yes, I know it's considered dangerous for someone to be bed-bound for very long. Nowadays they get you

up with amazing speed, and it seems to work.'He studied her thoughtfully. 'I bumped into Joan Warne in

Torby. She sent her regards.' A twist curled his firm mouth. 'She ticked me off for marooning you up here when you have so much to do down at Chantries with Christmas coming on and your Grand Ball due at New Year.''I can manage,' Oriel said calmly.

'I told her so, but on second thoughts, maybe you ought to get back home.'

She stared at him, stunned. 'This is a change of tune!''Joan Warne called me a selfish brute,' he said.

'Well, so you are,' she agreed. 'But Linnet needs me, as you rightly said...'

'You can take Linnet home with you,' he said abruptly.She stared in disbelief. 'Do you mean that?'

He stood up. 'Let's do the washing up and get to bed.''Devil,' she said, catching at his arm, 'why are you letting

me take Linnet?'He looked down at her hard. 'For God's sake, don't touch

me,' he said thickly, then walked out of the room, slamming the door.

Oriel's knees shook under her. She sat down again and stared at the door. What had he meant by that? Had he seen the diary yet? Or had that been a flash of sheer temper over Joan Warne's badgering of him earlier?

She washed up alone and then dried up and put the things away, tidied the kitchen, banked up the fire in the range, then went into the sitting-room to see to that fire. Devil sat in his chair in front of the fire, staring into the glowing heart of the flames with a shuttered expression.

She hesitated. 'I'm going up to bed,' she murmured.He did not look round. 'Aye,' he said flatly.'Goodnight,' she said in a quiet voice.'Goodnight,' he replied curtly.

She had already put a hot water bottle in her bed, and had found an old paraffin heater in Clare's room which she had used to give the attic some faint warmth during the evening. Now she turned the heater off and got ready for bed, then dived under the bedclothes into the narrow strip of warm bed.

What was wrong with Devil? she asked herself. Why was he so odd tonight?

She fell asleep quite soon, worn out by her unaccustomed hard work during the day.

Next morning proceeded more or less as the first day had done. Devil brought her a cup of tea and left. She got Linnet up, made the breakfast and then told Linnet that they were going to stay at Chantries. The little girl was thrilled, but asked, 'What about my daddy? Is he coming?'

'No, Daddy has to do the work on the farm,' Oriel said gently. 'But he'll come and see you, I'm sure. And your granny will be back from hospital soon.'

While Linnet played in the sitting-room by the fire. Oriel ran up to pack some things for her. Passing Devil's open door she glanced inside and stopped dead. The ivory box lay on the floor beside his hearth. In the grate she saw a little pile of blackened, curled ash. She did not have to open the box to know what had happened to Clare's diary. Devil had destroyed it.

His reaction baffled her. He had breathed no word about what he must know she had read. He had given no indication of

his feelings at all.Clare's obsessed, pathetic confession must have had some

effect upon the man for whom she had lied, cheated, betrayed.Oriel closed her eyes briefly in pity for her dead cousin. She

could understand, if not approve, of Clare's conduct. Love had a strange effect on people. Clare, insanely in love with Devil, and aware that he only saw Oriel, had given in to the temptation of lying to break the bond between them. When she came to Oriel with that lie about being seduced by Devil, she had been making a gambler's throw of the dice, and her gamble had paid off. She had had the result she desired. Oriel had gone away, and Devil had been lonely enough to turn to Clare at a crucial moment.

But what a reckoning there had been! Clare's ten years of heartbroken isolation had been the price she paid for calling herself Devil's wife. She had destroyed their love and so had destroyed herself. Her jealousy had not been assuaged by separating them. Her love had never been returned. She had im-prisoned herself voluntarily with a man who was indifferent to her, and her years of imprisonment had been hell on earth.

Devil returned an hour later, to drive them to Chantries in his Land-rover, since any attempt to reach the house by climbing down the Banks would have led to disaster.

Linnet was waiting, in her warm winter coat and slacks, her dark hair hidden under a pink pixie hat, a thick woollen scarf flung round her neck.

Devil picked her up and kissed her nose. 'Have fun at Oriel's house, poppet, and be good, won't you?'

Linnet nodded. 'Why don't you come, too, Daddy?' she begged eagerly. 'Auntie wants you, don't you, Auntie?'

Devil glanced sardonically at Oriel. 'Auntie wants me, does she? That's nice to know.'

Very flushed, Oriel said, 'You know your daddy has to stay to look after the sheep, Linnet.'

Devil's grin mocked her. 'You devious Haggard!'Linnet frowned, puzzled. 'What does that mean, Daddy?''It means that Auntie Oriel has to learn to sing for her

supper,' he said.'Are we ready?' Oriel asked, her pulses pounding.'What does Daddy mean? Linnet pursued as Devil carried

her out to the Land-rover.'Daddy is being silly,' Oriel said flatly.

Devil gave her that sidelong, heart-stopping smile. She longed to wipe the grin off his handsome face. How dared he play cat-and-mouse games with her like this?

The drive was bumpy and slithery along the back lanes in a tortuous, roundabout fashion forced upon them by the snow-blocked roads. Eventually they reached Chantries and Devil parked outside the house.

Linnet sprang upon him, clasping his neck and kissing him lovingly. 'Daddy, Daddy, you will come and see me, won't you? Come every day? Will you miss me? Who'll cook your dinner for you?'

'I'll come and see you,' he promised. 'I'll miss you, too, and I'll cook my own dinner. There, any more questions, miss?'

She giggled, kissed him again, then gave him a saucy look. 'Aren't you going to kiss Auntie Oriel goodbye?'

Oriel hastily climbed out of the Land-rover. Devil laughed. 'You ask too many questions, Linnet. Have a good time.' He put

the case on the snowy ground, got back into the Land-rover and drove away.

Linnet raced around the house in a glow of excitement, looking into every room. Together, they chose the room she would have, and moved her clothes into the wardrobe and drawers. Linnet bounced on the bed and sighed ecstatically. 'Oh, Auntie, I love your house! It's the biggest house I ever saw.'

Joan Warne walked out from the village next day to have lunch with them. She showed a great interest in Linnet, and afterwards said to Oriel, while the child was skipping on the path outside the long saloon, 'Considering her background, she's a happy little thing.'Oriel nodded. 'Largely thanks to her father.'Joan looked incredulous. 'Oh, come on!'

Oriel shook her head, smiling seriously. 'Really, he adores her. You haven't seen them together. It's Devil's love that has sheltered Linnet from the problems of her mother's drinking and death. Linnet barely knew Clare. Clare spent most of Linnet's life shut in that room of hers. Ann Dervil has told me what their life was like in those five years. After Linnet's birth, Clare withdrew completely—probably deliberately.'

Joan looked sage. 'Post-natal depression to begin with, I would say. The drinking would have worsened the effect.'

Oriel nodded. 'I've no doubt you're right, but the effect on Linnet was predictable. The child got the impression that her mother hated her, blamed her for being so ill. I think Clare was afraid to love the child.''Afraid to love her? But why?'

Oriel shrugged. 'Love makes one vulnerable, doesn't it?—and Clare didn't want any more pain. So she just lost herself in drink. It was safer than facing the real world.''I always said she was a neurotic,' Joan nodded.

Oriel sighed. 'Just very unhappy, I'm afraid.' But Clare had brought about her own tragedy. She had dug the pit into which she herself had fallen. There is nothing as tragic as a self-manufactured hell. 'Well, at least Devil Haggard has let you take the child,' Joan went on. 'He has some sense.'

'Only until Ann Dervil comes home,' Oriel told her.'But you could give Linnet so much l'

'He's her father,' Oriel replied flatly. 'She loves him.'When Joan had gone, Linnet flung her arms round Oriel's

waist. 'I'm glad we're alone again. I like being just us.'Oriel laughed. 'Well, very soon there'll be some other

people coming. My little boy and my mother- in-law ...'Linnet nodded. 'Anatole.' She had been told all about

Anatole, and had showed great interest in him. Oriel had been afraid that Linnet would be jealous, but perhaps Anatole's absence at school had made him appear less of a threat to the younger child. Linnet's loneliness at Devil's Leap had made her eager to know other children. She was looking forward to meeting Oriel's son.

'I only hope that Anatole will be kind to her,' Oriel told Renée on the telephone, discussing the arrangements for the Christmas holiday.

'I'll speak to him,' Renée promised. 'Anatole is a reasonable child. He'll temper the wind to the shorn lamb. They have something in common, remember.''Yes, they've both lost a parent,' Oriel agreed.

'I meant you,' Renée said drily. 'They both love you—that's a bond.'Oriel laughed. 'Well, let's hope so!'

Devil came every day, but refused to enter Chantries. Without allowing Linnet to realise his motives, he took her out with him in the Land-rover for drives each day, returning her to the door and always leaving at once. Oriel could have hit him. He was being as stubborn as a pig.

His manner towards her was curt to the point of rudeness. There was no warmth in him. What had the revelations of Clare's diary done to him? she wondered. Did he feel guilt, as she did? Or had he merely been angry when he read Clare's outpourings of passion and jealousy, her confessions of the lies she had told them both?

Remembering Devil's face when she accused him of pursuing Clare before she left for Africa, remembering the violent savagery with which he had smashed his fist against the lodge walls, she could guess something of his anger towards Clare for the mess she had made of all their lives, but had he felt no pity towards her for the ruin she had made of her own?

Oriel's own regret and danger had been expunged as she read Clare's pathetic words. Anyone who had suffered as Clare had done deserved pity.

On a crisp winter afternoon, Anatole and Renée arrived for the Christmas holidays, driven by Mr Weedon in the Rolls, with Iris and her mother eagerly gazing out of the windows as the car rolled up the drive.

'I thought we weren't going to get here,' Renée said, shivering as she was handed out of the car. 'The roads are appalling 1'

'Come into the warmth,' Oriel invited, kissing her and her son. 'Anatole, you've grown again. You'll be a beanpole if you keep this up. What do they feed you at that school?'

Linnet peeped round the door at the arrivals, her little face pink with shyness. Anatole regarded her stolidly. 'That her?' he asked in a penetrating whisper.

'Yes,' Oriel said, 'that's Linnet. Be kind to her, Anatole, won't you?'

He made no reply, but his stare was not unfriendly, and in a little while Linnet ventured out to join them, stealing her tiny hand into Oriel's for reassurance.

It took only twenty-four hours for Anatole to accept Linnet. By the following afternoon he was acting towards her with all the pompous patronage of an elder statesman towards a young man. Kindly, a little scornful, protective and domineering, he allowed her to follow him around and join in all his pursuits. Together they explored the wintry park. Together they made elaborate models of ships. Together they played ball in the terrace and dominoes in the saloon, with Linnet painfully counting the white dots on the dominoes while Anatole yawned patronisingly.

Their relationship brought back to Oriel a faint echo of her relationship with Devil in those far-off days of their childhood, except that she had been as reckless as Devil in their wild games.

Christmas came with bitter winds and grey skies. They had a huge Christmas tree in the saloon. The fairy lights flashed in the leaded windows, colouring the snow outside. There were fascinating piles of presents which the two children pinched and

fingered whenever they got the chance, guessing in the time-honoured fashion what they contained.

'I wonder what's in this funny long shape,' Oriel murmured in mock bewilderment, staring at a parcel addressed to herself in Anatole's writing. 'I wonder if it's a gun?'

'No,' Linnet cried, blazing with excitement, 'It's a ... mmm!' Her last words silenced by Anatole's hand over her mouth.

'Don't tell, silly!' he commanded her wrathfully, dragging her away like a trailing doll, her blue eyes sparkling over the top of his hand.

Oriel laughed. Last night Anatole had asked her suddenly, 'Is Linnet going to be my sister for ever?'

She had looked startled and said, 'Linnet is only staying with us. You know that.' Then she had asked him, 'Would you like her to be your sister?'

He had shrugged. 'I don't mind. She's not bad— for a girl.' His brusque tone had not quite covered his real feelings, and she had been unaccountably moved by his affection for the little girl. She had been afraid he would be jealous or resentful.

On Christmas Eve Devil arrived with an arm full of gaily wrapped presents. Anatole, who had met him once or twice briefly, stared at him without speaking. Oriel was dying to know what her son thought of Linnet's father, but she had feared to ask. Devil's attitude to him was as enigmatic. They be-haved, in fact, like two strange dogs meeting for the first time, circling each other warily. Oriel wished she could guess which way they would jump. Would they accept each other, or move into an armed hostility which could threaten the future for all of them?

When the presents had been heaped beneath the tree, the two children scampered off to play in the gallery upstairs, where they had set up a pitched camp of cushions and old sheets draped over two clothes-horses.

'I've been told my mother can come home for Christmas,' Devil told her. Ann had been detained in hospital with an unwelcome touch of fever which the doctors had been anxious about since it might prove to be a complication in her progress back to health. 'I'm driving there this afternoon to pick her up and take her home.'

Oriel's heart sank at the news. Of course, she was glad Ann was better, but she hated the thought of parting with Linnet so close to Christmas. She said as much, and Devil nodded.

'I thought you would say that, and I know Linnet is looking forward to Christmas here, but of course, my mother must have first claim. Her Christmas would be very sad without Linnet.'

Oriel hesitated, then said quickly, 'Couldn't you both come here, Devil?'

He looked down at her, his brows drawn. 'You know the answer to that.'

'Why must you be so pigheaded? Ann would come if you were willing to come.''But I'm not willing,' he said flatly.

Tears pricked at her eyes. She turned away, biting her lip. Behind her, he said brusquely, 'I'll compromise. Linnet can stay here for Christmas Day, but I'll pick her up and take her home for tea so that she'll spend part of the day with my mother.'

Oriel turned to smile at him, the tears still shining in her green eyes. 'Oh, thank you, Devil, thank you I'

He turned away without answering, and left soon afterwards.

Christmas morning dawned as coldly as the previous days had done, but at Chantries the day was illuminated by the happiness of the children opening their presents and joyfully displaying them to all and sundry.

'This is our happiest Christmas since Egon died,' Renée said contentedly, watching Anatole and Linnet pulling crackers with shouts of delight. She smiled at Oriel. 'That little girl has really made this Christmas. She has such a spirit of joy. And this house, my dear, was a stroke of pure genius on your part. It's far more of a home than that barracks in Hampshire which cost Egon so much money. York- shire is rather remote, and very cold, but I can see why you love it so much.'

Oriel watched the children, too, and sighed. She had not yet told Linnet that she was going home that night. She was afraid there would be tears to spoil this lovely day.

But when Devil arrived, amid shouts of joy from Linnet, his news that her grandmother was home smoothed over the temporary sadness of her leaving. She waved goodbye to Anatole energetically. 'See you soon 1' she called.

Anatole looked crotchety for the rest of the evening, sulking over his new books and jigsaw puzzles. 'I don't see why she had to go,' he said crossly in bed that night. 'She could have stayed with us. I bet it's no fun up there anyway.'

'You always like to see your grandmother, don't you?' Oriel put to him.

He made a face. 'Suppose so.' Then he dived under the bedclothes before she could kiss him goodnight and she had to content herself with a peck on his hair.

Her pile of presents lay on the table in the saloon. She smiled at the shocking pink umbrella which Anatole had brought her, the secret of which Linnet had so nearly betrayed. Linnet had given her an exquisite little paperweight of glass in which spirals and dots of colour were embedded. Aware that this was really Devil's choice, Oriel picked it up and studied it. The delicacy of the work was enchanting.

She had given Devil a present via Linnet, who had innocently printed her name on the gift tag under the impression that she had truly chosen the gift. Devil's sharp glance from under those black brows had told Oriel that he knew to whom he owed thanks.

She had chosen to give him a valuable antique pair of binoculars which had belonged to Jeremiah Haggard. They were as clear and powerful today as when they were first ground in the nineteenth century. A brass plate let into the side bore the name Haggard and the date of acquisition. Oriel knew that Devil loved to watch the wild birds in flight over the Banks as he tended his sheep. Her one fear had been that he would show signs of resentment at her daring to give him a gift through his daughter, but he had said and done nothing to indicate anger.

When Renée had gone up to bed and the house was still, Oriel stood in the window of the saloon beside the Christmas tree, staring out into the darkness of the park which was now lit by the moonlight shimmering over snowy ground. Their first Christmas at Chantries had come and gone. What would the next year bring?

CHAPTER TEN

ON the morning of New Year's Eve a procession of cars drove up the newly mended pathway to the front door, unloading their passengers before passing round to park in the stable yard at the back of the house. The London visitors had that familiar city look: paler faces, brighter manners, richer clothes than the villagers of Torby were accustomed to seeing in the Dales.

Oriel and Renée welcomed their friends, chatted to them for a while, then released them into Mrs Weedon's motherly hands so that she could show them to their rooms to rest after their journey. Throughout the day the arrivals were constant. The house buzzed with voices. Doors slammed. The servants hurried from place to place with hunted expressions.

Renée went upstairs to lie down two hours before dinner. Oriel took a last look round, her brow furrowed. All their guests would be dining with them, leaving the servants only an hour in which to clear the table and prepare for the much larger influx of Yorkshire people coming purely for the ball.

The London caterers sat playing cards in a corner of the kitchen. They had brought most of their food down with them, pre-packed for rapid service. Oriel had elected to have a cold buffet. It was the only practical idea in the circumstances, but since they were to serve it halfway through the evening she hoped their guests would be sufficiently heated, sufficiently tired to find cold food palatable despite the icy weather.

Baskets of flowers stood in alcoves and on small tables, their unseasonable beauty hothouse bred outside the United Kingdom, flown in no doubt from warmer parts of the globe. The saloon glittered from the crystal waterfalls of the chandeliers to the gilded Louis XV mirrors on the walls. The band was resting in the conservatory, among the potted palms

and climbing plants, smoking cigarettes and drinking black coffee in the steamy atmosphere. When she apologised to them for putting them in there they had grinned and said that it was the best place on a bitter night like this—like being in a Turkish bath, the violinist added cheerfully.

Dinner was a happy affair. Anatole was permitted to stay up for this part of the evening, and his grandmother's friends made much of this fortunate heir to a great fortune. Oriel thought several times that Egon had been wise to dictate his own school for his own son—there, at least, Anatole was treated with impartial firmness as a very ordinary boy among his peers.

After dinner, Anatole kissed her goodnight and reluctantly dragged himself upstairs. 'I shall never sleep, though,' he warned her. 'There'll be too much noise.'

'Read for a while, then,' she conceded. 'But do try to get to sleep, darling.'

An hour later the second part of the evening began with the first arrivals from the district—Joan and Phil Warne being among these, with Joan resplendent in bright blue chiffon which flared as she walked. Phil looked distinguished in evening dress, as Oriel told him.

'Flattery will get you everywhere,' he returned solemnly, while Joan beamed and clung to his arm.'You look stunning,' she told Oriel.Oriel laughed. 'Thank you. So do you.'

'When this mutual admiration society has a recess,' Phil said drily, 'I suggest we head for that bar over there. I feel I'm going to need a drink to get through the evening. I've never seen so many diamonds in my life. Who have you got here, Oriel? Half the crowned heads of Europe?'

'That wouldn't amount to more than three people,' Oriel pointed out. 'These are the uncrowned heads, and these days, believe me, they count for much more than mere royalty.''The jet set, in other words?''Some of it, anyway,' she admitted.

'Good lord! Imagine me being in the same room as the jet set,' Joan breathed.

'I shouldn't get too excited. They're rather dull,' Oriel warned her.

'They look like the fishmonger's window,' Phil said drily. 'Bulging eyes and scaly faces ...'

Oriel got the giggles. 'Ssh ... someone will hear you! Go and get that drink before you get shot!'

She turned to greet some new arrivals and was once more absorbed into the polite, distant world into which her marriage had dragged her. Standing at the door, slender, elegant, and aloof in her sleek white jersey silk dress, which clung to her body like a second skin, she smiled and smiled until her facial muscles ached.

The evening wore on; the band played gay dance tunes, the guests swirled gracefully beneath the chandeliers, their jewels glinting in the light, their restless eyes watching everyone else.

Oriel danced with Phil Warne once, with Alan, who had driven down during the evening and was booked in at the Woolpack with several other of the guests, with a poker-backed Colonel whose conversation consisted of a series of barked remarks.

During the supper break she sat with Alan and the Warnes. Alan was very polite, but he somehow made it clear that he

would have preferred to be alone with her, and after a while the Warnes made an excuse and moved away.

'You're looking very well,' Alan told her flatly as they went back into the saloon.

'So are you,' she said with equal courtesy. She had seen far less of him in recent weeks. He had, at last, taken the point and given up hope, she thought.

They moved on to the dance floor again to a waltz, but as they passed the main door she saw Devil there, watching them with an enigmatic expression. Her heart leapt in her breast.

He was wearing evening dress. She had never seen him in such clothes before, and the revelation took her breath away. He looked dazzlingly handsome, his dark hair brushed glossily, his wide shoulders and lithe hips emphasised by the well-cut suit.

She had not expected him to come. Indeed, she had not invited him. His appearance left her breathless.

Alan glanced round to see what had attracted her attention, and froze. 'That's the chap we saw on the day of the auction,' he muttered, then his brows knitted. 'What's he doing here? I thought there was a family feud?' He looked down at her in sudden suspicion. 'Have you made it up with him?'

She halted as they drew opposite Devil and broke away from Alan to welcome him. Alan followed her possessively, hovering behind her with a scowl.

Devil glanced at him in cool mockery, clearly recognising him, in his turn. Then he bowed to Oriel. 'Gate-crashing is a Haggard hobby,' he said teasingly. 'May I have the rest of this dance?' Before she could answer he had seized her in his arms and spun her away from Alan into the throng of the dance.

She looked up at him from beneath her lashes, her slanting green eyes veiled. 'Troublemaker I You deliberately offended Alan then.'

'Your executive boy-friend? Am I supposed to find the idea of offending him alarming?' Devil's tone bristled.

'Why are you here, Devil?' she asked. 'I was astounded to see you. For weeks you've refused to cross my threshold except on Christmas Eve, yet you turn up tonight unheralded.''You can always ask me to leave,' he retorted.

Their eyes fenced. Hers fell under the bright blue challenge of his, and she felt her fingers tremble in his hand.

'Get your flunkeys to throw me out,' he went on softly. 'It won't be the first time, will it?''Don't be absurd,' she returned unevenly.

They moved in silence for a while, then he said huskily, 'You look like an untouchable ice maiden in that dress. Are you, Oriel?''Am I what?''Untouchable and made of ice?'

Her heart pounded against the smooth white bodice. She did not answer. Moving in his arms like this she found it hard to breathe or think: She was only aware of the hardness of his thighs against her, the lean strength of his hands, the power of those muscled shoulders. The brilliant room seemed to revolve around her. She saw their figures in the gilt mirrors, the black and white of their clothes seeming to melt into one another in motion. Their steps flowed. His arms tightened on her waist, holding her so close she could scarcely breathe.

Then the music ended and reluctantly they moved apart, staring at each other. Devil bowed. 'Thank you, Mrs Mellstock.'

Then Renée was beside them, looking at Devil with shrewd eyes. 'Ah, Linnet's father. How nice to see you again 1'

Devil smiled with that heart-stopping charm he used so rarely and always with such devastating effect. 'You look very charming tonight.'

Renée's bright eyes surveyed him. 'If I were younger I would feel my heart flutter at that remark, I fancy, Mr Haggard.'

He smiled again. 'I'm sure you've made hearts flutter before now, Mrs Mellstock.'

A thin young City stockbroker appeared at Oriel's elbow and asked for the next dance. His mother was an old friend of Renée's. Oriel had to smile and accept, but she found it hard to whirl away from Devil and see him become surrounded by curious, admiring young women from the jet set who found his masculinity startlingly new after the more sedentary attractions of their normal partners.

Some time later Oriel saw him dancing close to her, his partner chattering to him, her false lashes fluttering captivatingly. Devil was listening with apparent fascination. As he slid the girl past, he glanced suddenly at Oriel and their eyes met. She felt her legs turn to jelly at the intimacy and hunger of that look.

The evening wore on endlessly, but Oriel had no chance to see him again. She was in constant demand, and her duties as hostess kept her separated from him. When she did see him, at a distance, he was always dancing with some pretty, sophisticated young thing upon each of whom he clearly had a devastating effect.

She began to long for the evening to end. Her teeth ached from constant smiling, her back ached, her calves throbbed

from dancing. She wanted nothing but her own bed and deep, dreamless sleep —a sleep mercifully empty of dreams of Devil, she hoped.

She hated all those smart London girls who were pursuing him so avidly. Jealousy stung each time she saw him with one in his arms. The ball became a form of torture.

At last people began to leave. The weary band played on, but the dancers grew fewer. Renée, worn and yawning, made her adieux and went up to bed. Soon most of the others drifted off, too.

'We're going,' Phil told Oriel cheerfully, passing her near the door. 'We've had a wonderful time. Thank you. By the way, Joan's invited your friend Alan to lunch. I'm afraid she hopes to do a spot of matchmaking.' He grinned. 'I thought it only fair to warn you, as my own notion is that you have your eyes set elsewhere, but I might be wrong.' His bright eyes watched her closely, and she gave him a forced smile.'Tell Joan not to bother,' she only said in reply.

Phil nodded with solemnity. 'And no comment to the other question?'

Oriel knew her colour had deepened- 'No comment,' she agreed with a pretence of calm.

She searched the rooms for Devil. There was no sign of him; he must have left without saying goodnight to her. She felt a mixture of rage and pain. She felt continually that she hovered on the edge of bliss, yet was always kept out by something in Devil that made him refuse to capitulate. What had he said to her the other day? That she had to learn to sing for her supper? What on earth was it supposed to mean?

The ball ended flatly. The last few guests trailed away. The servants yawned and began to make desultory attempts at clearing up.

'Tomorrow,' said Oriel. 'We'll do it tomorrow. Get to bed now, all of you.'

An hour later she sat on her dressing-table stool listening to the silence which now reigned over the whole house. The windows of all the rooms were dark. The servants and guests were all asleep. Only the low whisper of the wind around the windows disturbed that peace, and the crack and groan of the branches of the oaks in the park.

Her head ached. She looked into the mirror and saw her green eyes over-bright with fatigue and emotion. She had taken off her beautiful white dress with all her usual care and hung it in the wardrobe. She sat there in her slip with naked shoulders, her silvery hair streaming loose down her back, not in any mood to sleep yet without the concentration required to read or think. She needed to do something, to throw herself into violent action of some kind. Although her mind was weary, her body was restless.

Suddenly she got up and went to the tall chest of drawers on the other side of the room. She found a white sweater and her jodhpurs, then found her thick tweed hacking jacket in the wardrobe. She dressed in them rapidly, pushed her feet into her riding boots and tiptoed out of the room, switching off the lamps before she left.

Her mare turned a startled head as she appeared in the stable door. The liquid eyes rolled in the long head. Oriel ran a calming hand down the mare's smooth coat, murmuring softly beneath her breath, and the animal relaxed, mumbling Oriel's

collar beneath her upper and lower lip in an affectionate gesture.

Five minutes later she was galloping over the snowy grass of the park.

The moon shone bright and hard in the night sky, reflected back from the windows of Chantries on to the snowclad ground in a million faceted images.

As she galloped the wind blew her long hair backward like a Maenad's locks, and she felt a surge of exhilaration at the freedom and power of the motion. In the glittering ballroom she had felt stifled. Now her whole body came alive. She felt revived, renewed.

Under the darkness of the trees shadows moved with the wind; branches dipped and swayed, snow slid silently from branch to ground, owls skimmed in circles, searching for food, a fox scurried to cover as she passed. Even at night the park was populated. The search for survival went on endlessly. A family of badgers lived in the sandy fastness of Oak Knoll, on the outskirts of the park, where Chantries Wood began and stretched for half a mile. The lithe black and white bodies rolled snuffling around the badger run by night.

Oriel's passing disturbed all these creatures. They were used to hearing humans at night, but they feared them. Usually humans came with traps or guns to snare or shoot pheasants, partridge, rabbit.

She drew rein as she approached Oak Knoll and wheeled away. The woods were too dangerous at night. There were too many rabbit holes for her mare to catch a foot in and come crashing earthwards.

Suddenly she heard the muffled thud of other hooves. She peered through the trees and saw the big black stallion before she saw his rider.Her throat grew congested, her face flamed. An instinct old as time, and totally primitive, made her kick at her horse's ribs to urge speed. The mare broke into a gallop. Within seconds Oriel heard the other horse coming behind her, black neck stretched in effortless speed.She bent over the mare's neck, coaxing her to more speed, but it was useless. The stallion was far too big, far too powerful. It shot past her, wheeled, and Devil's hand caught at her bridle. Her mare halted, trembling, her breath steaming on the cold air.Devil was all in black, a polo-necked sweater and black leather jacket. His teeth flashed whitely.'Well, well, well, if it isn't Mrs Mellstock!''Who did you think it was?' she asked crisply.'Mrs Mellstock,' he retorted.'Let go of my bridle,' she ordered.'Haven't you learnt to beg yet, Mrs Mellstock?' he asked lazily. 'Time's running out.''What is that supposed to mean?'His blue eyes narrowed on her face. 'Oh, you know what it means, Mrs Mellstock.''Stop calling me that!''Gladly,' he said. 'When it ceases to be your name.''I'm cold,' she said. 'Will you please release me?''What are you doing out here at this time ofnight?' he asked her.'I couldn't sleep.'

He glanced over his shoulder. 'The Lodge is still empty, isn't it? We could make a cup of coffee.'

The Lodge was still being made habitable so that Ena's brother could move in after his wedding. Oriel looked doubtfully at the building, tempted by the thought of being there alone with Devil, yet afraid at the same time. All evening she had longed to be in his arms, but now she drew back in alarm. It was one thing to dance with him in the glitter of a ballroom and quite another to find herself locked in mortal combat with him out here in the empty silence of the park, with all die masks polite society imposes discarded and only the bedrock violence of their emotions between them. She remembered suddenly how her nerves had leapt when he once said to her that only an act of total violence could sever the chains that bound them together.

Devil was watching her, reading her thoughts. 'Don't be such a little coward,' he said abruptly.

Her chin shot up. 'All right,' she agreed, and together they rode to the Lodge, tethered the horses outside and went into the building.

She made coffee while he watched, then they sat down in the newly decorated kitchen to drink it.

'You have to get up early to look after your sheep,' she said to him. 'You shouldn't be out here all night. You ought to get home and sleep.'

He finished his coffee and pushed the cup away. 'How the hell can I sleep?' he demanded thickly.

She stood up, alarmed by the emotion in his voice.'We'd better go.'

He caught her by the shoulders, spun her round to face him, his blue eyes dark with hunger. 'Beg, Oriel, before you drive me

out of my mind ... I can't sleep or eat or think... I'll not break my word, but you know you only have to say it...'

Her pulses beat so fast she was almost smothered by the clamour of her blood. For a moment she faced him in silence, her tongue frozen, wanting to abandon her pride yet lacking the courage to expose herself and face his triumph. The long duel had weakened her, but her pride still had some power.

Devil's hands tightened intolerably on her shoulders. He shook her violently, his face blazing with anger. 'Say it, say it, you stubborn little coward 1'

The words burst out, trembling with emotion. 'I love you.'His face swam before her eyes, the hard bones seeming to

tighten until they stood out through the brown skin. 'Again,' he demanded huskily.

'I love you, you bastard. What do you want? Abject collapse? If I were that sort of weak-kneed fool would you want me anyway? We've made some damn stupid mistakes in the past. Must we prolong them into the future by demanding victory over each other? Can't you just...' Her voice broke.

'Just what?' he asked, bending towards her, his eyes holding hers hypnotically.

'Kiss me,' she whispered. 'Please, Devil... make love to me... I want you like hell, please ..

The last word was lost as his mouth came down in exultant ownership and her arms were flung up to pull his head down, cradling the rough dark hair in both hands. Their bodies swayed together, clinging hotly, his hands stroking her waist and back.Suddenly Devil pulled away and looked down at her drowsy, intent face. 'Time to go,' he said thickly.

'No,' she protested, clinging to him. 'Devil, stay with me. Love me...''Are you going to marry me?' he asked brusquely.'Of course,' she brushed the question aside. 'But tonight, Devil, stay tonight. You said yourself you couldn't sleep. Neither could I—that was why I went riding. I had to do something, to keep my body active, to stop myself wanting you. I was on fire.''We'll be married as soon as possible,' he said.'Darling, kiss me again,' she pleaded.'By God, you ask for trouble,' he broke out. 'I don't want you this way. We should have married when you were seventeen. I've waited all these years, I'll wait a while longer.''How can you say that when you stood here not so long ago and begged me to ...''And you refused,' he reminded her.'You were married 1'His face darkened. 'Yes, Clare. You know the truth now. You read that damned diary of hers.'She nodded. 'Devil, I didn't just accept her word. I rode over to see you and ask you for the truth, but you were out, and in your room I saw a letter to her. It made me believe Clare.'He frowned. 'What letter?'She quoted the beginning of it, and he made an angry motion of realisation.

"I remember it. The night before she'd tried to get me to make love to her, and I wrote to her to tell her that if she ever did such a thing again I would have to speak to her uncle. I told her to keep out of my way in future, I said I loved you and could never feel anything for her.'

'Oh, Devil!' she groaned, leaning her head against his chest. 'I was such a fool.'

'Yes,' he said harshly, 'you were. But so was I, to take second-best and marry Clare later. I should have stuck to my principles. It was my stupid pride that made me do it.'

'And my stupid pride that made me go away to Africa,' she whispered.

He nodded. 'That's why this time I mean to do things in the right way. Nothing would give me greater pleasure, my love, to take you up on your tempting offer, but I'm going to wait, and so are you.'

'Are you sure?' she asked, winding her arms around his neck and pulling his head down so that she could kiss him.

He laughed softly against her mouth. 'Temptress !' His mouth parted her lips, the long kiss deepened until they were both breathless. Devil pushed her away. 'Stop it, my love. Do I have to give you another beating?'

'Oh, very well,' she sighed. 'You're right, of course. Having given way I want to abandon everything, I suppose.'

'Would you abandon Chantries?' he asked drily.She peeped up at him. 'Oh, you'll get Chantries now. Your

ambition will be satisfied at last.''My one ambition is to take possession of this body of

yours,' he said starkly.Hot-cheeked, she laughed. 'You will come here to live after

our marriage? You and Linnet and your mother?' Her mouth dented in a smile of amusement. 'Your mother has as much right here as anyone; it's poetic justice. And do you know, darling, I have the feeling old Jeremiah would really be glad. I think he loved your mother all his life. Something she once said

to me, and what I remember of my uncle, makes me suspect that our story was just the echo of theirs. Only ours is going to have a happy ending, and their story never did.'

'What a romantic you are,' he said. 'Jeremiah was a hard-hearted old skinflint, not a hero of blighted love.'

'He was unkind to you, I know, but I think that was due to his own unhappiness. Anyway, Chantries will be yours, now.'

'I don't want the damned place,' he said. 'Although the whole of Yorkshire will say I married you to get it.''Our children shall have it, then,' she told him.

His blue eyes burned on her face. 'Our children,' he said huskily. 'I'm glad Linnet loves you. It will make it easier.'

'I love Linnet,' she agreed. 'And luckily, she and Anatole are already great friends. I prayed they would be.'

They walked out into the silent, snow-wrapped park and looked up at the moon. Cold and white and aloof, it sailed through the sky.

'That's what you reminded me of the day you came here for the auction,' Devil told her, his arm around her waist. 'I guessed you would be here and I rode over here with the one thought in my head— that I would see you again at last. You'd obsessed my mind for so many years, but my memory of you had been so different. I'd carried the picture of a towheaded, long-legged girl, and out of that Rolls climbed this blonde moon-goddess, wrapped in money and hauteur, with an aura of exclusivity which was almost visible.'She laughed. 'You fool! I'm not like that at all.'

His eyes skimmed her from her mouth to her slim legs. 'So I found when I'd peeled the layers of the onion one by one, but at first you gave that impression.'

'And you were up on your high horse at once!''I was blazingly angry. I determined to strip off the hauteur

and the self-assurance, and I used a blow-torch.' He grinned. 'I'll never forget your face when I gave you that whipping. I saw you then as you'd been long ago. It called back yesterday.'

'You're a wicked devil,' she told him. 'And I adore you.'He turned and kissed her raised mouth. The horses shuffled

and blew wreaths of misty breath into the cold air. The wind ruffled the snowclad trees. The white moon silently sailed past and did not care that the two lovers far below her had found the way to call back yesterday.