Follow Thy Desire

Jennifer went to open the door, wearing a long dress for once in deference to the occasion. Helen could hear her calling a welcome to Mr and Mrs Fox, and as her parents moved out into the hall to greet their visitors, she dutifully followed after. There was nothing to be alarmed about, she told herself severely. Barry was here now, and he would see that she had no time to worry about anyone else.

But when the Foxes came into the hall, Barry was not with them, and seeing Helen’s anxious face, Mrs Fox exclaimed immediately:

‘Now don’t get upset, Helen. Barry’s not coming. He’s been off colour all day, a head cold, I think, and I’ve insisted that he stays home tonight to make sure he’s fully recovered for Saturday.’

‘That’s right.’ Mr Fox added his reassurance to his wife’s. ‘Morgan’s had a look at him and he says it’s nothing serious.’

‘I—I see.’ Suddenly the evening loomed ahead fraught with uncertainty. ‘Well, if you’re sure…’

‘He’ll ring you tomorrow,’ said Mrs Fox comfortingly, patting her arm, and as she did so, Morgan came in through the open door.

Tonight he was wearing a dark grey lounge suit, that looked almost black in the subdued lighting of the hall, but it was evidently new and fitted much better than his other suit had done. It threw his light hair into stark relief, complementing the darkness of his tan.

‘I locked the car,’ he said to his father, tossing the keys in his hand, and then turned to Helen’s parents, greeting them with ease and friendliness. To Helen he addressed the politest of smiles, complimenting her on her appearance with characteristic detachment.

Mr Raynor closed the front door, and Mrs Raynor led the way into the sitting room. While their parents exchanged small talk about the weather and helped themselves to a drink, Jennifer took the opportunity to ask Morgan when he was going back to Osweba.

‘In about ten days, I guess,’ he replied good-humouredly. ‘I promised Andrea I’d be back before her birthday, and that’s in just under a month’s time.’

‘How old is she?’

Jennifer was not troubled with shyness, and he smiled. ‘Fifteen,’ he answered. ‘Fifteen years old.’

‘So she’s fourteen now. Like me.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘I’ll be fifteen in April. Where does Andrea go to school?’

‘She doesn’t,’ replied Morgan ruefully, and Mrs Raynor turned to reprove her younger daughter for asking so many questions.

‘Things are done differently in Africa,’ she said, giving Jennifer a quelling look, and Jennifer muttered that she wished she lived in Africa if that was the case.

‘You’d find life very boring, I’m afraid,’ said Morgan, accepting a Scotch and soda from Mr Raynor. ‘No clubs or discothèques, very little television and practically no cinemas.’

‘What do you do, then?’ asked Jennifer, aghast, and Helen nuged her in the ribs and told her to mind her own business.

‘I don’t mind telling her,’ said Morgan, his eyes meeting Helen’s with faint mockery. ‘We swim, and play tennis. And we read a lot. And occasionally we go into Charlottesville and have dinner at the Yachting Club.’

‘Do you have a yacht?’ exclaimed Jennifer, in awe, but Morgan shook his head.

‘No. But I have use of one when I need it. I have a very good friend in the government who lends me his from time to time.’

Helen looked down into the Martini her father had handed her. It didn’t sound a boring life to her. On the contrary, she thought how satisfying it must be, living quite a simple life, using his skills as a doctor to treat people of a different creed and culture. She wondered why he wanted to bring Andrea back to England. She would miss the kind of life she was used to, and no doubt she would miss her father, unless he planned to come back to England to live, too. Her heart missed a beat. What would she do if Morgan came to live in York again? If he moved into Banklands with his father and stepmother now that Barry was getting married and moving away? There was no reason why he shouldn’t, if that was what he wanted, but the prospect of finding him there when she visited her in-laws filled her with a ridiculous sense of dread.

She helped her mother to serve dinner. Mrs Raynor had no daily help, only old Mrs Latimer who came in two mornings a week to do the rough work, and as she was in her seventies now, more often than not Helen found herself cleaning up after her. But Mrs Raynor wouldn’t hear of asking her to leave, and besides, she enjoyed the gossip the old cleaner usually had to impart. Mrs Raynor herself worked three days a week as a dental receptionist, more to get her out of the house than any need for the extra money, but on her days off she and Mrs Latimer put the world to rights over pots of tea in the kitchen.

The meal was delicious, as usual—soup and fish, and a sweetly basted duckling in orange sauce. No one could find much room for the raspberry meringue that followed, but Morgan gallantly had a second helping, earning Mrs Ray-nor’s undying gratitude.

Afterwards, they all adjourned to the sitting room again. Helen, strung up and nervous, perched uneasily on the arm of her mother’s chair until Mr Raynor, noticing her restlessness, said:

‘Take Morgan into the study, Helen. I’m sure he’s not interested in all this woman’s talk. Show him that book I bought in Harrogate last week. All about his part of the world, it is. It’s a collector’s piece. I’m sure it would interest you, Morgan.’

Morgan, who had been seated on the couch between his stepmother and Jennifer, rose to his feet politely. ‘If Helen has no objection,’ he essayed smoothly, and after a moment’s hesitation, she got off the chair arm and walked towards the door.

‘Can I come?’

Jennifer’s treble was overridden by her father’s denial, and while her sister grimaced her disappointment, Helen led the way along the hall to her father’s study. Perhaps she should have invited Jennifer to join them, she thought, as Morgan leant past her to open the study door. She wasn’t at all sure her nerves were proof against being alone with him again.

The book her father had bought was lying on his desk and while Morgan closed the door, she went towards it determinedly, pointing at its worn leather binding. ‘It’s a guide to Southern Africa,’ she declared jerkily, ‘published before the First World War. My father collects books, as you can see.’ She gestured towards the book-lined walls. ‘And this book interested him because just recently he was reading Burton’s book about his pilgrimage to Mecca.’

Morgan seated himself on a corner of the desk, leaning over the book to turn the pages. ‘Your father’s interested in Africa?’ he queried, and Helen moved round the desk as she nodded.

‘He—he was there during the Second World War. North Africa, at least. They say it’s the most exciting continent, don’t they? That it gets into your blood? Maybe that’s why my father finds it so fascinating.’

‘He’d like to go back there?’ Morgan asked, straightening and folding his arms, and she shifted uneasily beneath his gaze, fiddling with the amulet that hung around her neck.

‘I—I think so. Not that he’s ever tried. He and Mum—well, they usually spend their holidays in Spain, but perhaps after Jennifer grows up they’ll have the chance to be more—adventurous.’

‘Adventurous?’ echoed Morgan wryly. ‘Is that how you see it?’

He slid off the desk then and to her horror came towards her. Her mouth went suddenly dry and her tongue clove to her palate, but she could not move. Every intimate thought she had ever had about him rushed through her mind in a chaotic stream, and weakness brought a betraying tremble to her knees. What was he going to do? she wondered desperately. Had he guessed why she was so nervous in his company? Had he sensed the paralysing awareness she felt in his presence that made a mockery of her feelings for Barry?

When he stopped before her, she almost swayed against him, but his hand reached out and lifted the gold amulet on its chain, and when he moved closer it was to read the inscription.

‘Do you know what this says?’ he asked, and the normality of his tone was like a cooling draught against her forehead.

‘I—what—oh, no! No.’ She shook her head, and as she did so, the chain moved sinuously against her neck. ‘It—it’s in Arabic, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ Morgan’s brows had drawn together in a frown as he observed her agitation, but with a tightening of his lips, he read: ‘Follow thy desire while thou yet livest!’ He dropped the amulet again. ‘Such things were engraved on the walls of temples and tombs. Rather too late for their inhabitants, but not a bad maxim for the mourners at the funeral feast.’

Helen’s tongue appeared to moisten her upper lip. ‘Is—is it a maxim you follow, too?’ she asked unsteadily, aware that for some reason he was angry with her, but unprepared for the violence her words evoked.

‘No,’ he said harshly. ‘No one can. Not unless one is totally without conscience.’ His tawny eyes raked her upturned face with grim bitterness. ‘Are you totally without conscience, Helen? Is that why you’re looking at me like that? What do you want me to do, I wonder? Does a last-ditch affair appeal to you, before the bonds of matrimony tie you down? If so, you’re wasting your time here. Find somebody else to satisfy your desires, because I happen to have a conscience, and whatever Barry thinks of me, I respect him!’

For a minute, Helen was too stunned to answer him, but then a kind of guilty indignation came to her rescue. ‘How—how dare you?’ she gasped, choking on the words. ‘I didn’t invite you here, and I certainly didn’t want to spend any time alone with you! You’ve mistaken a natural effort on my part to act in a polite and friendly fashion towards my fiancé’s brother for something quite ludicrous, and embarrassed us both. You’re despicable! I think you’d better leave. You can make whatever excuses you like to my parents, I don’t care, but I hope I never have to speak to you again!’

She whirled on her heel to make her grand exit, but almost against his will, his arm came out barring her way, and when she turned in the other direction he stepped into her path. There was a look of torment in his face, his mouth twisting with self-derision, and then he reached for her, his hands curving around her nape, compelling her firmly towards him.

‘God, Helen…’ he muttered with a groan, and all her talk of despising him went for nothing beneath the demanding possession of his mouth.

Her head swam with the first touch of his lips. It was all one with the caressing compulsion of his hands on her neck, his thumbs probing the hollows behind her ears, his fingertips exploring the source of her spinal cord. Her hands were crushed between them and when she moved her fingers they encountered an unbuttoned opening in his shirt and curled inside. His skin was warm and roughened with hair, and when she separated more of the buttons from their holes she felt the responsive constriction of his muscles.

His mouth left hers to seek the hollow of her neck, and his hands slid down her spine to her hips, drawing her close against the hardening muscles of his thighs. She had never been so close to a man’s body before, but instead of wanting to pull away, she pressed herself to him, arching her body and creating an intimacy between them that destroyed any hope of dismissing this embrace as the casual result of enforced proximity. They were both fully aware of what they were doing, and his tortured breathing was the only sound she could hear.

It was his hands on her upper arms that finally separated them, forcing her back from him while he still had the strength to do so. Her eyes, seeking his face, could see the actual physical control he was exerting and the strain it was putting upon him.

‘You’re crazy, do you know that?’ he demanded, pushing back his hair with an unsteady hand, but when she made a sound of protest and swayed towards him again, he turned his back on her and put the expanse of her father’s desk between them. ‘Stop it, Helen!’ he ordered tautly. ‘We can’t do this. My God, anybody could have come in and found us!’ He broke off, shaking his head disbelievingly. Then he went on: ‘That sister of yours, for example. How do you think she would have felt if she had come in? How would she have reacted finding her sister in another man’s arms only two days before the wedding!’