Spirit Of Atlantis

‘All right.’

With an indifferent shrug he came up beside her, and she smelt the clean male odour of his body, still damp and faintly musky. His nearness disturbed her, not least because he was barely half dressed, his shirt hanging open, his jeans low on his hips, and she could remember how he had looked in the water. He was certainly attractive, she thought, unwillingly wondering who he was. He didn’t look like the guests at the hotel, who on the whole had that look of comfortable affluence, and to be riding a motorcycle in a country where everyone drove cars … She frowned, feeling an unfamiliar tightness in her stomach, and to combat this awareness she said:

‘Goodbye, then.’

He nodded, pushing the ends of his shirt into the belt of his pants, and she waited apprehensively for him to finish. But when he did, he didn’t immediately move away from her. Instead he looked down at her, at the nervous twitching of her lips and lower to the unknowingly provocative rise and fall of her breasts.

‘Goodbye,’ he said, and before she could prevent him, he slipped one hand around her nape and bent his mouth to hers.

Her hand came out instinctively, but encountering the taut muscles of his stomach was quickly withdrawn. She made a protesting sound deep in her throat, but he ignored it, increasing the pressure and forcing her lips apart. She felt almost giddy as her senses swam beneath his experienced caress, and then to her horror she found herself responding.

‘No!’

With a cry of dismay she tore herself away from him, turning aside and scrubbing her lips with the back of her hand. She felt cheap and degraded, and appalled that just for a moment she had wanted him to go on.

‘See you,’ he remarked, behind her, but she didn’t turn, and presently she heard his footsteps crunching up the slope to where he said he had left his motorbike.

She waited until she heard the sound of a powerful engine before venturing to look round, and then expelled her breath on a shaky sigh as she saw she was alone. He had gone, the receding roar of the motorcycle’s engine indicating that he had taken the route around the lake.

Feeling slightly unsteady, Julie flopped down on to a smooth rock nearby, stretching her bare legs out to the sun. Not surprisingly, she no longer felt like going for a swim, and she wondered if she would ever come here again without remembering what had happened.

Shading her eyes, she tried to calm herself by surveying the outline of an island some distance away across the water. Everything was just the same, she told herself severely. Just because a strange man had erupted into her life and briefly disorganised it, it did not mean that she need feel any sense of guilt because of it. He had taken advantage of the situation—he was that kind of man. He was probably camping in the woods with a crowd of similarly-minded youths, all with motorcycles, and egos the size of their helmets.

With a sigh she got to her feet, picked up her towel, and scrambled back up the slope. She would swim later, she decided. Maybe she would persuade Pam’s twelve-year-old son to join her. At least that way she could be reasonably sure of not being bothered.

The hotel was set on a ridge overlooking the sweep of the bay. It was a collection of log cabins, each with its own bedroom and bathroom, private suites, with meals taken in the main building close by. Backing on to the forest, with a variety of wildlife on its doorstep, it was a popular haunt for summer visitors, who moored their craft in the small marina below and climbed the stone steps to the front of the hotel. The only other approach was through the forest, but the trails were not easily defined unless one knew the way, and only occasionally did they attract visitors this way.

Pam Galloway’s mother had been a friend of Mrs Osbourne, Julie’s mother, and the two girls had known one another since they were children. But Pam was eight years older than Julie, and in 1969, when Julie was only ten years old, she had married a Canadian she had met on holiday in Germany, and come to live in this most beautiful part of Ontario.

Julie had missed her, but they had maintained a warm if infrequent correspondence, and when tragedy struck three months ago Pam had been first to offer her a chance to get away for a while. Canada in early summer was an enchanting place, and its distance had seemed remote from all the horrors of those weeks after her father’s death. Her friends in England, her real friends, that was, had urged her to go, and with Adam’s willing, if melancholy, approval, she had accepted. That had been almost a month ago now, and she knew that soon she would have to think about going back. But she didn’t want to. Somehow, living here had widened her perspective, and she could no longer delude herself that everything her father had done had been for her. Returning to England would mean returning to the emptiness she had discovered her life to be, and not even Adam could make up for all those years she had lived in ignorance. She had thought her mother’s death when she was twelve had unhinged him. Now she knew that only Adam’s money had kept the firm together, and her father’s whole existence had been a sham.

Pam and her husband, David, had their apartments in the main building. It was easier that way. It meant they were available at all hours of the day and night, and an intercommunication system connected all the cabins to the small exchange behind the desk. The reception area was already a hive of activity when Julie came in, and Pam herself hailed her from the doorway leading to the spacious dining room.

‘Hi,’ she exclaimed. It was the usual mode of greeting on this side of the Atlantic, and Julie was getting used to using it herself.

‘Hi,’ she responded, swinging her towel in her hand. ‘Is that coffee I can smell brewing?’

‘It sure is.’ Pam wrinkled her brow as the younger girl approached her. ‘You’re back early. No swim?’

‘No swim,’ agreed Julie, not really wanting to go into details, but Pam was too inquisitive to let that go.

‘Why?’ she asked. ‘You’re not feeling sick or anything, are you? ‘Cos if you are, I’ll phone Doc Brewster right away.’

‘No, I’m not sick.’ Julie forced a smile. ‘As a matter of fact, the lake was already occupied, and as I didn’t feel like company …’ Her voice trailed away, and passing Pam’s more generous proportions with a sideways step, she walked across the restaurant to take her usual table by the window.

The dining room was empty, but the waitresses were already about, and one of them, Penny, came to ask what she would like.

‘Just toast and coffee,’ Julie assured her firmly, aware of Pam’s enquiring face in the background, and the girl knew better than to offer the steak or eggs or maple syrup pancakes that so many of their visitors seemed to enjoy.

‘Well?’ Pam prompted, coming to stand with plump arms folded, looking down at her young friend. She had put on weight since her marriage to David, and having sampled the meals served at the Kawana Point Hotel, Julie wasn’t really surprised. Steaks tended to weigh at least half a pound, with matching helpings of baked potatoes or french fries to go with them, while the desserts of cream-filled pastries or mouthwatering American cheesecake simply added inches just looking at them. Julie felt sure she, too, would burst at the seams if she enjoyed their hospitality for much longer, although her own level of metabolism seemed to dispute this anxiety.

‘Well, what?’ she said now, hoping Pam was not going to be difficult, but the other girl seemed determined to discover the facts.

‘Who was occupying the lake? No one from the hotel, I’m sure. I didn’t know anyone else knew of that cove.’

‘Nor did I,’ replied Julie, playing with the cutlery. ‘But obviously we were wrong.’

‘So who was it?’ Pam persisted. ‘Not campers? There’s barely room to pitch a tent.’

‘No, not campers,’ Julie assured her resignedly. ‘It was just some man, a tourist, I suppose. He said he was staying down the far end of the bend in the lake near the cove.’

‘You spoke to him?’ Pam was interested, taking the seat opposite her and gazing at her with twinkling eyes. ‘Hey, how about that? All these weeks you’ve rebuffed every introduction we’ve arranged for you, and now you go and meet some guy down at the lake!’

‘It wasn’t like that,’ declared Julie wearily, wishing she had played invalid after all. ‘He was just—swimming, and—well, he spoke to me. It was all perfectly innocent and certainly nothing for you to get so excited about.’

Or was it? Julie couldn’t prevent the unwilling surge of some emotion along her veins, and the remembrance of how he had held her and kissed her brought goose-bumps out all over her body. Hoping Pam would attribute them to the chilly air-conditioning of the dining room and not to any other cause, she folded her arms on the table and surreptitiously looped her fingers over the most obvious flesh on her upper arms.

‘So who is he?’ Pam urged her, arching her blonde brows. ‘Did he give you his name?’ She frowned. ‘I don’t know who he might be staying with. The Leytons and the Peruccis have summer places along there, but they don’t normally associate with the common crowd.’

‘Pam, it was no one like that.’ Julie shook her head. ‘He was riding a motorbike, or’—she added blushing—’he said he was. He just wasn’t the type you think.’

‘Ah, older, you mean?’

‘No. Younger.’ Julie looked up in relief as Penny brought her toast and coffee. ‘Mmmm, this is just what I needed. It’s quite chilly in here, isn’t it?’

Pam waited until Penny had departed and then looked at her impatiently. ‘So what was his name? Did you get it?’

Julie sighed. ‘Prescott,’ she said reluctantly. ‘Dan Prescott.’

‘No!’

Pam was regarding her in disbelief now, and Julie wished she would go away and stop making a fuss about nothing. It was bad enough having her morning disrupted, without Pam sitting there looking as if she had just delivered her a body blow.

‘Pam, look, I know you mean well, but I am going to marry Adam, you know. It’s all arranged. Just as soon as I feel able—’

‘Julie, did he really say his name was Dan Prescott?’ Pam interrupted her, leaning across the table, her hand on the younger girl’s wrist preventing her from putting the wedge of toast she had just buttered into her mouth.

Julie pulled her hand free and nodded. ‘That’s what he said.’

Pam shook her head. ‘My God!’

Julie regarded her half irritably now. ‘What’s wrong with that?’ she demanded, popping the wedge of toast into her mouth, and wiping her fingers on her napkin. ‘It’s a common enough name, isn’t it? I mean, he’s not an escaped convict or anything, is he?’ Her features sobered somewhat at the thought.

‘No, no.’ Pam shook her head vigorously now, half getting up from her chair and then flopping down again as she realised Julie deserved some explanation. ‘Julie, Dan Prescott is Anthea Leyton’s nephew!’ She made an excited little movement of her hands. ‘Anthea Leyton was a Prescott before she got married, and the New York Prescotts are the Scott National Bank!’

Julie put down her knife and lay back in her seat. ‘So what?’

‘So what?’ Pam licked her lips. ‘Julie, don’t you realise, you’ve been talking to Lionel Prescott’s son!’