Juliet Armstrong - Isle of the Hummingbird Page 2

  He was easier to talk to—or, perhaps, to listen to—for admittedly he had a lot to say for himself. His home was in Reading, and he used this line fairly often because Southampton wasn't so far off, and because the ships called at so many ports en route. He enjoyed his work; it brought him in contact with a great many people, and gave him a chance to make use of his knowledge of languages, which happened to be fairly wide.

  'Foreign languages came fairly easily to me at school,' he explained. 'I wasn't much good at anything else, though I managed by sheer swotting to collect an A level in Chemistry.'

  His tone was modest, but a moment later he was accusing himself of egotism, and asking her about herself and her plans. Was it an impertinence to enquire her destination? And whether she intended to make a long visit—to friends or relations?

  Although she did not resent his questions—he was too artless to give offence—she told him very little. And when he saw that she preferred to keep her own counsel he tactfully steered the conversation into less personal channels, telling her something of the delights that awaited her on this trip, which was so much more like a cruise than an ordinary voyage.

  'Although I've travelled this way many a time,' he said, 'I've never lost the thrill which comes from waking up, within a few days of leaving the grey chill of an English winter, and finding oneself in brilliant sunshine—blue sky above and blue sea around one— finding oneself warm.' And he went on to describe the attractions of the Spanish and Portuguese ports they would be visiting—the startling beauty of Madeira, whether one came to it by day as a hill smothered in flowers, or by night, decked at every level with jewelled lights.

  She listened with what surely must have been flattering absorption, but before very long he was on personalities again.

  'Please don't think me horribly impertinent, Miss Moore. But I see from the list outside the dining- saloon that you've been put to sit with an Archdeacon and his wife and, I presume, sister. I caught a glimpse of them coming on board and they seem a little elderly for you.'

  'Oh, well, they may be quite nice.'

  'I'm sure they are. But there's often a little rearrangement of the seating once the ship has sailed. If you would give me permission to speak to the Chief Steward, whom I know quite well, I'm sure he would put us at a table for two—or at least, with young people.'

  She did not answer him directly then. A thought had struck her, and she asked with a faint frown: 'But how did you find out where he had placed me? You've only known my name a few minutes.'

  'You're wrong there!' A gleam of mischief lit up his dark eyes, but the next moment he was explaining half apologetically: 'I noticed you on the boat-train as I walked down the platform. You were getting into a non-smoking compartment. And then—well, I happened to be behind you and your porter as you came on board. I suppose I ought to have resisted glancing at the label on your suitcase, but I'm afraid I didn't.'

  'Is your friend the Chief Steward used to your putting this sort of request to him?' she enquired drily.

  'Actually he isn't. I'm no wolf.' He sounded a little offended.

  'I'm sure you're not,' she said coolly—far from sure, all the same. 'I don't think it would be sensible to ask for a table for two. We might be disagreeing madly before the voyage was half over. But to team up with another man and girl might be fun.'

  'Maybe you're right,' he conceded. 'It would be terrible to find, after getting you to myself, that I bored you stiff. I'd be jumping overboard with shrieks of dismay!'

  She had to smile at that. He might not be the simple, straightforward, innocuous young man he wished to appear, but he was gay and amusing. And after mixing with all sorts at Roselands, she was well able to take care of herself.

  She accepted a drink from him and went with him in search of the Chief Steward, who promised sympathetically to fix them up satisfactorily the following day.

  And so, because of its impermanence, Bryony entered on a friendship with Hugh Woods—this fellow- passenger of whom she knew so little. The sort of easy friendship on which she had clamped down, almost before it could begin, ever since the shock she had received two years ago, on her twenty-first birthday: the shock from which she had never quite recovered.

  His sympathetic manner, the consideration which he showed her at every turn, encouraged her by degrees to talk to him with something less than her habitual reserve. Indeed, she felt tempted sometimes to go beyond trivialities and tell him of the trouble at her heart. But she refrained. For all his kindness, his gentleness, he would be embarrassed if she began to confide in him. He wanted a bright and amusing companion—someone with whom he could share the delight of this journey into the sun. And that was the way it must be.

  The other pair at their table in the dining-saloon were an attractive newly married couple—the wife French, the husband Italian. And it was at once clear that Hugh's claim to a knowledge of languages was no empty boast. But he was careful that Bryony should never feel left out. The Morettis were bilingual, but whether they were talking French or Italian, Hugh translated their jokes and remarks at lightning speed, helping Bryony rub up the smattering she had acquired at school, and the Morettis, too, in their efforts to learn English.

  At Vigo, where they went ashore for the first time, in glorious sunshine, she found that he was equally at home in Spanish. And all this solid proof that he had spoken truthfully about himself gave her a confidence in him which, for all his charm and thoughtfulness, she had not had in the beginning. She had liked him, been attracted to him, but was not sure that she altogether trusted him.

  Not that this had mattered very much. For once this voyage came to an end it was unlikely that they would ever meet again. Still, it pleased her.

  He had business in the port, so did not join her on the tour organised by the Purser and his assistants. He had been driven round the town many times, visited churches and the famous Museum, explored the fascinating shops, but even so would have enjoyed accompanying her. As it was, he collected her at the restaurant where the party was to lunch and carried her off for a tete-a-tete meal at a little establishment famous for its fish—an establishment where he seemed on the best of terms with the smiling, swarthy proprietor and his stout wife.

  'They want to know if we're engaged to be married,' he told her, 'and are terribly disappointed to hear that we've known each other only a few days. They tell me that you have the look of an an angel. And you have, Bryony—there's a touching innocence about you, especially side-view——— '

  'Now don't start rambling away about my profile— the line of my cheek,' Bryony interrupted crisply. 'People are always doing that, and then telling me that my full-face expression can be very hard.'

  'So it can. But one day when you fall in love, this contradiction will go.'

  She did not answer that, but when he took her hand she let it lie in his.

  Sitting here in this little restaurant, with its odours of garlic and fish, its noisily cheerful clientele, she had the feeling that one day perhaps this tight band round her heart might break. It was an odd place to feel this way. A fragrant garden bright with flowers would have seemed more likely as a background for such hopes. But there it was.

  She even began to think that this job ahead of her might help to lessen the tensions of the last two years. Peregrine Gray, so different from his sister, would remain the reserved, withdrawn employer, paying her well to ensure the peace necessary for his work, but otherwise unaware of her presence. And she was more than content that this should be so. She didn't, in the old-fashioned phrase, take to him. But the girls, Anne- Marie and Sally—the very fact that they were lively and a trifle out of hand showed that they were human. If she could win their affection, find that they laughed at the same things, life might, by degrees, present a lighter aspect.

  Hugh, as she was calling him now, insisted on buying her a large bunch of mimosa and a box pf handmade chocolates, and she found it easy to respond to his mood of gaiety as they hurried back to t
he ship. But as soon as she reached her cabin her pleasure was abruptly shattered.

  She had known that she might no longer have the place to herself, but she had expected a fairly congenial fellow-traveller. Instead, a handsome but ill-tempered-looking Spanish type was there, strewing her possessions everywhere, and clearly determined on taking the lion's share of the space. By ordinary standards there was plenty of room for two passengers. But this insufferable creature was thrusting the hangers on which Bryony had put her clothes to the very corner of her wardrobe—having apparently overflowed the empty one—and when requested to keep to her own side of the cabin remarked in execrable English that since she had far more clothes than the English Miss she required more space—that one wardrobe was insufficient for her needs.

  She went on to declare that she was a victim to migraine and so preferred Bryony's bed, by the porthole, to the vacant one, that she was going to 'demand to the cabin steward' to change the sheets.

  Flushing with annoyance at her overbearing behaviour, Bryony took it upon herself to ring for him. But, busy with oncoming passengers, he failed to hear and answer the summons, and hating to be alone another minute with this aggressive woman, she quickly went in search of him.

  Unable to find him, she began to look instead for Hugh. At least he would be able to remonstrate with the wretch in Spanish—show her that the despised young Miss was not alone and friendless.

  He was on A Deck, watching the quayside activities, and when she told him that a bullying Spanish woman was making things unbearable for her in her cabin, he was as angry as she could possibly have wished.

  'I'll soon settle that nonsense,' he explaimed. 'I'll get on to the Purser—he's a very decent chap—and ask him to do something. There are other cabins with vacant berths, I'm sure—with older people, of her own nationality, who'll know how to deal with her. Just wait here while I cope. There's no need for you to become involved at all.'

  His efforts succeeded beyond her hopes. He came back within half an hour to assure her that the intruder, who'd been put in the wrong cabin anyway, was being shifted into a larger one on another deck, where the present occupants, two middle-aged German fraus, were clearly able to defend their rights.

  'Incidentally, she's not Spanish. She's a South American of sorts. I realised that from her accent when I heard her vituperation.'

  The incident helped to cement their friendship. Sitting on deck that evening, well wrapped, as it could still be chilly after sunset, she told him more of her plans than she had hitherto done. All she had said so far was that she was going to work au pair as housekeeper to a family in Trinidad—he in turn telling her that he would be going straight on to Grenada and St. Lucia, and other islands in the Caribbean chain, fetching up at Jamaica, and probably returning some months later by Trinidad.

  Now she mentioned the name of her employer—Dr. Peregrine Gray—and was taken aback to find that he was sharply sorry for her.

  'I can't imagine you'll be happy in that household,' he said. 'He has the reputation of a foul temper—and those sisters of his——-!'

  'Have you met them? Do you know them personally?' she countered quickly.

  'I've come across Dr. Gray in the course of my work, and found him extremely discourteous. The girls I don't know at all.'

  'My first interview was with a married sister of his, living in London,' she said. 'I liked her—and, gathered that Dr. Gray was utterly devoted to his work,'

  'Devoted to his wealthy patients. So they say. It may not be true. But from my own experience, he likes getting the bawbees in rather than parting with them.'

  'He's certainly not been stingy with me.' Ruffled and dismayed, Bryony felt bound to stand up for Peregrine Gray. 'I've been put, obviously, in one of the most expensive cabins I Well, he's done all the paying.'

  'No doubt he realises how lucky he is to have found a girl like you to come out "on spec" to look after his rather odd household. Anyway,' and he leant over and brushed her smooth cheek with his lips, 'you can always clear out if you find the job impossible. I've quite a few business acquaintances in Port-of-Spain, not only among chemists but among hairdressers and beauty specialists. With your looks and manners, you'd soon find a decent post.'

  Half minded to tell him of the promise she had given, to stay with the Grays for at least twelve months, she decided against it. In the circumstances it would border on disloyalty. And after all, much as she liked Hugh and enjoyed his company—his light kisses, even—she must remember the things she had heard about shipboard romances. She had known him less than a week. It was far too soon for serious confidences.

  She said only: 'I shall do my best to make a success of the job. It can hardly be tougher than running a seaside hotel—as I've been doing, more or less, for the past few months.'

  'You've really been doing that?' There was surprise, admiration and another less easily analysed emotion in his voice—as if he was summing up and considering what she had told him. And then he remarked slowly: 'It could be a great asset—a touchingly ingenuous appearance combined with a keen business brain.'

  She laughed at that. 'Are you suggesting that I could be a successful crook?'

  'Hardly I What do I know of the crooked fraternity, anyway? No, I was thinking that you'd be wasted in a domestic job. That you ought to have stayed in business, of one sort or another.'

  She shook her head.

  'I can do with a bit of home life,' she said, 'and I shall probably feel that way even more by the end of this voyage. It's lovely—but quite unreal.'

  'That's what I would say of every other trip I've made to the islands. Something to enjoy—and forget. But this time—I suppose I'm a sentimental fool, Bryony, but I wish it could go on for ever—or at least that there was no good-bye to face between you and me.'

  She gave him a teasing smile.

  'Just the kind of remark I've been warned to expect from shipboard acquaintances! The truth is that six months from now you'll be trying to recall my name—if you think of me at all.'

  He took up her hand and kissed it.

  'Bryony. The sweetest name for the sweetest woman I've ever met. How could I ever forget!'

  As the great white liner took them farther and farther into the sunshine Bryony's delight in the voyage increased.

  Life was one round of pleasure—swimming and sunbathing on the boat-deck, eating delicious meals made still more enjoyable by the friendly stewards with their genuine desire that their special patrons should choose the most delectable items on the long menu—and by the Moretti couple, with their chat and jokes. Then in the evenings, watching films, or dancing.

  Determined not to allow herself to be monopolised by Hugh, she danced with all and sundry, finding the ship's offices among the most agreeable partners. To her relief, he did not prove too possessive—merely grousing a little. And it was she herself who experienced astonished resentment, when she saw him dancing, twice in succession, with the intolerable South American woman whom he had been instrumental in having removed from her cabin.

  She had encountered Senora Blavona several times and they had studiously ignored each other—a course which Hugh had described as the only sensible and dignified one. And here he was, holding her in his arms—an attractive woman in her way, it had to be conceded, especially when, all signs of ill temper gone, she wore that come-hither smile.

  Needless to say, Bryony was determined to appear blandly unconscious of his behaving in any way oddly, but Hugh himself brought up the subject when dancing with her again.

  'I expect you were astonished to see me chasing round after that Venezuelan dame,' he said, 'but it's all in the cause of business. I happened to hear, in the bar, that she's bound for Trinidad—that she's joining a firm of hairdressers and beauty consultants in Port-of-Spain. So when she smiled at me over the rim of her wine-glass this evening—you were waltzing with the First Officer at the time—I felt bound to wade in.'

  'But if she finds out that it was through your in
fluence with the Purser that she was pushed out of my cabin—————'

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  'I doubt if she remembers much about that afternoon. She wasn't a hundred per cent sober, you know.'

  'Maybe not. Though it would have surprised me less to hear that she was under the influence of some drug or other.'

  He looked at her sharply.

  'She didn't strike me that way. Anyway, she's perfectly normal now, so far as I can judge. But what a bore it is, talking about her, when we could be talking about each other. Let's go up on the boat-deck and look at the stars.'

  Glad to have his reasonable explanation, she was ready enough to fall in with his suggestion. It was crowded in the saloon—it would be pleasant to be in the fresh air.

  And that evening, under the spangled sky, the dark rushing water far below, the barriers of reserve between them were gradually broken down. Somehow he slipped into talking about himself, in a way he had never yet done—speaking about his boyhood and early youth in a shabby Soho street, before the family moved to the more sober and less colourful town of Reading.

  He admitted now that his name was the most English thing about him—that and his State school education. His father had been a naturalised Greek, of quite lowly origins, and his mother an Italian of the professional class. After his father's death, his mother had appealed to her relatives in Florence. But, still resentful over her marriage, they had not even replied.

  It touched her that he should confide in her like this, tell her of the struggles his mother had made to get him into a business college and keep him there, of his joy in being able to repay her now—to some extent at least.

  Had they met in less glamorous circumstances, she would probably have listened sympathetically, but said nothing about herself. As it was, sitting there with his arm round her, cut off for the moment from all other human beings, she allowed him to draw her out, telling him of the shock she had received two years earlier in learning about her own birth.