Drop of the Dice (43 page)

It was soon after her nineteenth birthday that Lance gave me the stole. It was a beautiful thing trimmed with lace and thousands of tiny seed pearls; being silver grey, it toned with everything and was very useful to wear round my shoulders at some of the evening parties we attended. It was elegant in the extreme but at the same time very outstanding. People never failed to admire it when I wore it; and if I did not do so many enquired what I had done with my beautiful seed pearl stole.

There was one man whom we met frequently in society. I disliked him intensely from the moment I set eyes on him. He was big, florid of complexion, with fleshly indulgence written all over his face; he ate heartily, drank heavily and was reputed to have a voracious sexual appetite. His name was Sir Ralph Lowell but he was generally known as Sir Rake, a name in which he delighted. He had what I can only call a ‘familiar’—a pale-faced, mean man, as tall as himself but about half the width. This was Sir Basil Blaydon. Sir Basil was ill-favoured rather through expression than feature. He had very small pale blue eyes which seemed to dart everywhere, noting the disabilities of everyone, and a thin curved mouth which seemed to express delight in them.

I used to say to Lance. ‘Why do we have Lowell and Blaydon? We could well do without them.’

‘My dear,’ said Lance, ‘Lowell is one of the most reckless gamblers I ever knew.’

‘Even more so than yourself?’ I asked.

Lance smiled with his imperturbable good humour. ‘I am cautious in comparison. No, we have to include Lowell. He would come in any case. I have known him appear uninvited now and then.’

‘Well, I don’t like him in the house—nor that man who comes with him.’

‘Oh, Blaydon just walks in his shadow. Just ignore the two of them since you don’t like them.’

And whenever I mentioned my abhorrence of these two men, Lance always turned my objections aside with a light remark which was so much more effective than a protest would have been.

So we continued to endure Sir Rake.

I was a little dismayed when his son, Reginald, became friendly with Sabrina. Reggie, as he was known, was a poor creature, as different from his father as it was possible to be. He was a tall, gangling youth with pale eyes and skin and he was clearly cowed by his father who seemed to despise him. He limped slightly which was due to a fall when he was a baby. His mother had died as the result of a miscarriage when she was trying to produce another of the sons which Sir Rake desperately wanted. So the only son he had was Reggie.

It was perhaps typical of Sabrina that she should be interested in Reggie. Sabrina wanted to look after people; to manage their affairs, to care for them; and to do this she must find someone in need of care. Poor Reggie, slightly crippled, cowed by his father and dismissed as of little importance by most people, fitted the role perfectly.

I am sure that at first it was pity with Sabrina. Other young women had little desire for his company; she would show them all that she, the most sought-after among them, was willing to pay some attention to poor Reggie.

She would seek him out. At first the poor young man was bewildered and then he would look for her and if she did not appear he would be wretched; when she did come his eyes would light up with such adoration that I began to be alarmed.

They would chat together and she even persuaded him to dance with her. He did this clumsily because of his disability but she always looked as though she were enjoying the dance and I heard her tell him once that there was no one she would rather be with.

I talked to Lance about it. He shrugged his shoulders. It was unwise, he said, to interfere in the affairs of the young.

‘Could she marry him?’ I persisted.

‘If they agreed it, of course.’

‘I mean, would it be wise? Reggie is dependent on his father… and as for Sabrina going into that household… it makes me shudder to think of it.’

Lance’s thoughts were elsewhere. He said lightly: ‘These matters work themselves out.’

It was at times like this that I felt irritated with him, and disappointed. Dickon, I felt sure, would have understood my fears. At least he would have given his attention to them.

I decided to speak to Sabrina.

‘Do you think it wise to give so much of your attention to Reggie Lowell?’ I asked.

‘I like Reggie,’ she answered. ‘And I think he likes me.’

‘I’m sure of it,’ I said. ‘That’s the trouble. He likes you too much. I think he’s in love with you.’

She nodded, smiling gently.

‘But, Sabrina,’ I went on, ‘I know you feel sorry for him, but is it right to lead him on to think…’

‘To think what?’

‘Well, that you might marry him.’

‘Why shouldn’t he think it?’

‘But you wouldn’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘Oh, Sabrina, do you really mean you’re in love with him?’

She hesitated and I went on triumphantly: ‘There, you see. You’re sorry for him. I know that. I know you well. But that is not enough.’

‘Enough? He needs someone to look after him, to show him that he would be all right if he would forget about not being so.’

‘Dear Sabrina, what you are doing is giving him the wrong impression.

‘I am not,’ she said firmly.

‘Do you mean to say you would marry him?’

‘I might.’

‘Sabrina! There are so many… you could have almost anybody.’

‘I don’t want anybody. I want to help Reggie.’

I was disturbed and then I began to think that perhaps she was right. Reggie needed her and Sabrina was the kind of girl who needed to be needed. It may have gone back to that incident on the ice and her father’s dislike for her. I had thought when she had saved my life we had wiped that out for ever, but perhaps some dramatic incidents made such an effect on the mind that they were indelible.

I saw that Lance was right, though. Matters must take their course.

And how was I to know what a dramatic and tragic course this would take.

Sabrina came to me in the garden where I was gathering roses. It was a lovely summer’s day. I could hear the voices of Zipporah and Jean-Louis in the paddock. They were riding there as they often did and Jean-Louis was teaching her to jump the hedge which separated the paddock from the home field.

I snipped my roses contentedly, picking the best blooms and thinking what a beautiful afternoon it was. I heard the buzzing of the bees which were marauding in the lavender which grew in profusion round the pond where now and then I saw the flash of the goldfish which Zipporah called her own because she liked to feed them. The smell of the lavender was sweet; there were white butterflies on the purple buddleia, and it was an afternoon for contentment—so I thought.

Sabrina was standing beside me. She looked cool in a green linen gown and a big shady hat—cool, beautiful and sure of herself.

‘Clarissa, I wanted you to be the first to know.’

I turned to look at her. There was a smile on her face and her lovely eyes were looking past me as though into the future.

My heart sank. I was afraid of what she was going to tell me.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘you’ve guessed. I’m going to marry Reggie.’

‘Sabrina!’

‘You don’t approve, I know. Dear Clarissa, I promise you that it will be all right.’

‘Do you… love him?’

Again that momentary hesitation. ‘But of course,’ she said at length, almost irritably.

She looked so beautiful standing there—and so young, that I felt she had not yet come to womanhood. When she did, she would be a vibrant, passionate woman. There would just be some man who would awaken her—but it was not Reggie. I knew that she would marry him for pity and that was no good reason for a woman like Sabrina to plan for her future happiness.

‘Have you thought of this
very
seriously?’

‘Of course,’ she said, again with that touch of irritability which suggested to me that she was far from sure.

‘Perhaps if you waited a little…’

‘Waited? Who wants to wait? I shall soon be twenty years of age. Most people are married when they are as old as that. Oh, Clarissa, I want to make up for all that he has suffered. He has been through so much with that dreadful father of his.’

‘He will be your father-in-law, think of that!’

‘One does not marry for the sake of a father-in-law.’

‘No, but you would doubtless come into contact with him often.’

‘We should not. I should see to that. I should take Reggie far away. We would visit rarely… just for convention’s sake. His father has not been very good for him. In fact it is his father who has made him what he is… timid, uncertain… a little afraid of life.’

‘Do you really want to marry a man like that?’

‘I want to marry Reggie. I can help him.’

‘Sabrina, you should be a wife, not a… reformer.’

‘You are being a little difficult, darling. It is not like you. You have always understood and helped me. Oh, don’t you see what parents can do to their children? When they are young they feel things so deeply.’

I could see the past in her eyes. I remembered vividly that time when Jeremy had come to her and let her know that he hated her for what she had done to her mother.

She was right. Parents’ actions could be very significant to impressionable children. She remembered still, and she saw that Reggie was one who had not had the good fortune to fall into the hands of someone who was as sympathetic as I had been. I loved her so much because she cared for others, and passionately I wanted her to find the happiness she deserved.

I think I could have become reconciled to the marriage if there had just been Reggie. It was the thought of the family connection with Sir Rake which appalled me. I had hated the way in which his eyes dwelt on all women—including myself. He had an air of assessing them and speculating as to how he could get them into his bed. I was sure that he lived up to his reputation.

But Sabrina was determined and none could be more so when she had made up her mind to be.

When I told Lance he was only mildly interested. He was going to his club and was already thinking of the night’s play ahead.

I did discuss the matter with Nanny Curlew, who regarded Sabrina as her own child.

Nanny Curlew said: ‘Well, we wanted a good match for her, but if she really loves this young man, I’m agreeable.’

Nanny Curlew obviously had not heard the evil rumours concerning Sir Rake.

They had decided not to announce the engagement just yet, for which I was thankful. I did see Sir Ralph on one or two occasions. He came to us in Albemarle Street for a night’s play. Reggie did not accompany him. Sabrina was present and when I saw Sir Ralph’s eyes following her, assessing her in his lewd way, I was deeply disturbed, and it occurred to me that Reggie had probably told his father of his proposed marriage and that would account for Sir Ralph’s interest.

Then came the day when she was to visit the Lowells’ town house. A note had been delivered to her from Sir Ralph.

He wrote:

My dear daughter-to-be,

I cannot express the delight I felt when I heard from my son that you had agreed to marry him. I have always admired you so much and there is no one I would rather welcome into the family.

I want Reginald to bring you to see me, so that the three of us can have a little talk together. He will call for you at eight of the clock tomorrow evening. Just a family affair, one might say. Then we can plan how we shall make the announcement.

So humour me in this. There is so much I wish to say to you.

From one whose joy it will be to become

Your Father,

Ralph Lowell.

‘He sounds as though he is pleased,’ I said when Sabrina showed me the note.

‘I think the stories about him have been highly exaggerated,’ replied Sabrina.

‘I thought he was unkind to Reggie.’

‘Quite a lot of fathers are,’ she retorted with feeling.

She would judge for herself, and for the occasion she would wear a very lovely gown in pink silk, cut from the waist to show a petticoat very finely embroidered beneath. The bodice was tight-fitting and rather low-cut and she looked exquisite in it.

I said: ‘You need something to cover your shoulders.’ I went to a drawer and brought out the seed-pearl-decorated stole. I draped it round her shoulders. The silver-grey of the stole and the delicacy of the pearls enhanced her gown. I had never seen the stole look so beautiful as it did on her that night.

She was full of confidence in the future. She was going to marry Reggie and make him a happy man; and this night she would face his father.

At precisely eight o’clock the carriage arrived. A footman knocked at the door. Sabrina was waiting. From an upper window I saw her get into the carriage and drive away. Not for a moment did it occur to me that the happenings of this night would affect us all so bitterly.

Lance was at the club and I was trying not to picture him at the card table, that intense look on his face as he gambled away… heaven knew what.

I preferred not to think of him. Instead I was thinking of Sabrina, about to marry and go away from us. So it happened. One day Zipporah’s turn would come. It was heartbreaking to lose those one had loved and cherished through their childhood, when one had been the most important person in their lives. But there must come the time when it was necessary to slip back and hand over the loved one to a husband.

Zipporah was young yet, but I was already beginning to wonder how much longer I should keep even her with me.

I should be rejoicing though in Sabrina’s happiness… if happiness it was. She was like a nun dedicated to a mission. She was marrying for pity. However, I must accept the fact that it was what she wanted and when she had set her mind on something she would never diverge from it.

I settled down to read. It must have been nearly two hours after the carriage had left when she came back. She was wrapped in an old cloak which she had certainly not been wearing when she left the house. She came into my bedroom and as she threw off the cloak I saw that her bodice was ripped open; her skirt was torn; there was a bruise on her neck and her face was the colour of parchment.