Authors: Jean S. Macleod
CHAPTER THREE
T
he taxi crawled along Harley Street. There was very little traffic, but the driver was checking the numbers above the massive doorways.
Laura, sitting forward in her seat as she neared her destination, was aware of her rapidly increasing pulse. She had been looking forward to this moment all day, but now that it was here she felt curiously shy and inadequate, almost wishing that she had not come.
She had dressed most carefully wearing the one evening gown she possessed, brushing her hair until it shone with all the highlights of burnished copper and finally discarding the thought of any jewelry. The low-cut emerald gown and her hair were color enough, she had decided, and she had searched London for the plain satin shoes, which were such a perfect match for the brilliant green of her dress. Her coat was black and rather shabby, but she had pressed it carefully the evening before, and in any case, it would be discarded in the hall.
The taxi came to a standstill before a lighted doorway and her excitement rose again.
“This is it,” the taxi driver announced jovially. “These one-way streets are a proper trial!”
Laura glanced at the number, nodding as she paid the fare.
“Yes
.
Thank you very much.”
The taxi pulled away and she was left standing on the deserted pavement, looking at the house. Although there was a light streaming out from above the door the rooms on either side of it were so heavily curtained that they presented a dark face to the outside world. The door itself, immaculate as all the other doors in that well-known neighborhood, with its discreet black paintwork and plain, brilliantly polished brass plate, gave little indication of what lay behind it.
It opened, however, before she could ring the bell, and it seemed to Laura that it was only held ajar sufficiently to allow her to go in. It was immediately closed behind her and the butler took her coat.
“Good evening, miss,” he said. “Will you come this way? The doctor is waiting for you.”
The hall was square and lofty, with a vast circular stairway rising at its far end and rich Persian rugs carpeting the tessellated floor.
Before Laura had time to cross it a door opened and Julius Behar came toward her. He looked different, she thought at once, and strangely formal in his evening clothes, but he was smiling.
“I might have known you would be punctual,” he greeted her, taking her by the arm to lead her into a brilliantly lit room on their left. “You have always struck me as being the soul of integrity, Laura.”
He had used her Christian name quite naturally, and if he had been deliberately trying to put her at her ease because he had detected her nervousness, there was no outward sign of it.
The room they entered was empty, and as he poured their drinks, she wondered if she had, indeed, been too punctual, if it would have been better to have timed her arrival for a little later, when the other guests were assembled.
“I’
ve an apology to offer," he said. “For the Strangs. They’ve been unavoidably delayed in Paris.”
“Oh,” Laura said, Tm sorry. I was looking forward to meeting them.”
She wondered if he had substituted another couple for Dermot and Mary Strang, whom she had worked with at the hospital, and then, suddenly, she knew that he had not. They would be dining alone.
A strange, quick surge of excitement rushed from her heart and climbed into her throat, and she became aware of tension and the smile in Julius Behar’s eyes that was half watchful, half mocking as he raised his glass.
“To our future acquaintance, Laura!” he said.
She raised her own glass and its golden contents seemed suddenly full of liquid fire. The lights from the heavy chandelier above their heads struck a million points of diamond brightness from the exquisitely cut crystal to reflect them back into her eyes, dazzling her for a moment as she looked into those other eyes across the hearth; then she told herself the idea was ridiculous, utterly fanciful and painfully absurd!
It was no use being dazzled by people to the point of remaining dumb in their presence if you wanted to interest them. She did not know why Julius Behar had asked her to dine with him, but he could not have any ulterior motive. He had nothing to gain from her friendship. On the contrary, it was he who had the most to give.
Looking about her as she finished her drink, she acknowledged the
tremendous stimulation that just being here afforded her. The whole place enshrined the man’s success. The thick carpet covering the floor was a genuine Aubusson; the few pictures adorning the walls were originals, lit softly and discreetly from above. There was nothing ostentatious, nothing jarring. The man and his home had achieved a peak of perfection. Laura put down her glass on a side table and looked across at her host. “I’m very curious,” she said, forcing her nervousness aside. “I want to hear all about you.”
He gave her a straight, amused look from under his dark brows, and his lips curved slowly in a smile.
“Rather a tall order, isn’t it?” he suggested, stooping to refill her glass. “Where do you want me to begin?”
“At the beginning, I think,” she suggested, wondering if he resented the intrusion but unable to contain her curiosity. “From when you first decided to take up medicine as a career.”
“That would be too boring,” he said, holding up his glass to the light so that, suddenly, she saw the true color of his eyes for the first time. They were a curious mixture of gray and green, an indefinable color that might vary with their owner’s varying moods, and she realized how mistaken she had been when she had thought them hazel. There was no true light in them. They were eyes that would smoulder suddenly or glint dangerously in anger, changing from green to the color of slate as the thoughts behind them varied. “I knew about my career, I think, right from the beginning,” he went on. “I had made up my mind and I was quite determined to succeed. It helps,” he added, looking at her directly, “if one knows what one wants.”
“Yes, I suppose so.” Laura’s voice was vaguely constrained, yet this was what she had wanted to hear. “Have you always lived in England?”
He nodded.
“My family came here from Germany two generations ago. My grandfather was an analytical chemist and he settled in London with his wife and two sons. They both married Englishwomen. My father was the younger of the two.”
“And a doctor?”
He shook his head.
“No. That was left to me.”
In the silence that followed he seemed to have closed the book on his family’s history, and Laura supposed she would never know whether his parents were dead or alive. Certainly it did not seem as if either of them lived with him here in this lovely old house.
“I trained at St. Clement’s,” he said, volunteering the information when the silence between them might have become oppressive. “The remainder of my experience has been gained abroad and in hospitals here in London, over the years.”
“Not so many years,” she reminded him. “You have had a very full life.”
“Full enough,” he agreed as the butler ca
m
e to announce that dinner was ready. “But that is the point of living, isn’t it?”
She followed him across the hall without answering, and in the perfectly appointed dining room they sat facing one another across a table that had been set for two.
“I think you ought to meet Holmes,” he said, turning as the butler moved toward a side table. “He’s my complete Man Friday—valet, butler, housekeeper at times! I should be entirely lost without him.”
Laura turned, considering Holmes in more detail. She did not like him. There was nothing she could fault in his manner. He was deferential without being obsequious, but his eyes seemed always to pass beyond her while still seeing everything. He had, too, a curiously scarred upper lip, which exposed his teeth, and his pointed features and receding hairline all added to the rodent look about him that she had found rather disquieting when she had seen him for the first time in the full light of the hallway. He bowed to her gravely, but she had the feeling that he did not expect to see her there again.
It was slightly disconcerting to be dismissed in such a way, but she made up her mind to forget it. Once or twice however, as the meal progressed, she was aware of his concentrated gaze. It was faintly quizzical but always discreetly averted as soon as she turned her head.
It really didn’t matter a great deal whether she liked him or not, she hastened to assure, herself as dessert was brought in and placed before her. They might never meet again.
Holmes withdrew and she was left alone with her host. They had chatted pleasantly enough throughout the meal and, as if he had guessed her desire and her keen interest, they had “talked shop.” Laura had sat entranced, listening most of the time, aware of the fascination all this held for her and discounting its danger with a reckless deliberation.
“Will you stay at St. Clement’s?” she asked. “Do you intend to go on consulting there?”
“For the moment,” he said. “I’m not quite sure that I want to make long-term decisions, though. It’s never entirely wise.”
She looked up at him, surprise in her eyes.
“That surprises you?” he suggested.
“A little. I would have thought that planning ahead would have appealed to you.”
He smiled, watching her closely.
“It did at one time,” he confessed, “but I have lived to see the futility of looking too far ahead.”
“We all try to do it, in one way or another, I think,” Laura said.
“What have you planned for yourself?” he asked abruptly.
She looked across the table at him, smiling a little.
“I’m not quite sure,” she confessed. “You see, I haven’t any outstanding ability.”
“Does that matter in a woman?” he asked. “Provided that she has all the other attributes?”
She felt the color rise and glow under her skin and she could no longer meet his eyes. They seemed to strip her of all pretence. He knew she admired him, and he must know that he was physically attractive, quite apart from the fascination his genius held for her. Yet, almost instantly, she felt curiously repelled. By his own admission he was a man who pursued his desires relentlessly, a man who knew exactly what he wanted and left no stone unturned until he possessed it.
“You know, I suppose, that I married two years ago,” he said.
The knowledge shocked her, coming so unexpectedly out of the blue. She had not known, and she could not understand why he should be telling her now.
“No,” she confessed. “I had no idea.”
“Strange,” he mused, “considering the far-reaching tendrils of the St. Clement’s grapevine! Of course,” he added abruptly, “we never lived in London for any length of time.”
“You have a home somewhere else?” Laura asked.
“In Scotland,” he answered. “I hope you will see it one day.”
His eyes held hers so that she could not look away.
“Laura,” he said, “I want you to marry me.”
“But that’s impossible.” Something dry and hard had risen in the back of her throat, threatening to choke her. “Your wife—”
“My wife is dead,” he said. “Our marriage lasted only a year.”
“I’m sorry.” All power of reasoning seemed to have left her. “I didn’t know.”
“How could you?” His eyes were greener than she had ever seen them. “She died in Scotland—in one of the remoter parts.”
“But—it must have been less than a year ago!”
Her words were a protest, an appeal to his memory and his former love. “We made a mistake,” he said. “We were completely unsuited to one another.”
“How does one know that?” she asked rather desperately as he pushed back his chair and came around the table to stand beside her.
“Like this!”
He drew her to her feet, pressing her hard against him, feeling the sudden wild and tumultuous beating of her heart, which was a confession without words. He tilted up her face and looked into her eyes, and before she could protest for a second time he was kissing her. She felt his hands, hard and possessive, on her bare shoulders and his mouth crushing hers. There was a moment of incomparable excitement, of ecstasy and a strange fulfilment as her whole soul seemed to be drawn through her lips, and then she was shivering with something like fear.
“What is it?” he demanded, still holding her. “Does the fact of my first marriage upset you, Laura?”
“No,” she said, “it isn’t that.”
“What, then?”
“I don’t know.”
He released her, picking up her fallen table napkin.
“I should have given you more time to think about it,” he said, “but I expected you to know what you wanted as definitely as I did.”
“I didn’t expect you to propose to me!” she laughed shakily.
“And now that I have?” he asked almost casually, “how long do you want to make up your mind?”
“I don’t know.” She found herself looking away from those searching, half-demanding eyes. “I ought to be able to answer, but I can’t. There are so many things to consider—”
“If you can name a few,” he said, “we can quite easily dispose of them while you are here.” He opened the door to lead the way back across the hall to the drawing room, where Holmes was setting out the coffee cups. “Leave the tray, Holmes,” he commanded. “Miss Elliot will see to the coffee.”
“Very well, sir.”
Holmes straightened and withdrew. He had put liqueur glasses on the tray and Julius crossed to the cabinet in the corner and drew out a slender bottle, which he held to the light.