The Perfect Temptation (8 page)

spoons are used on the royal
table," he offered, hoping that it

was a neutral enough comment. The
very last thing he

wanted was for her to make a
retreat into silence.

"Actually," she replied.
moving objects around the shelves

as she spoke, ''the lesson comes
in weighing public appearances

and private realities. Mrs.
Walker-Hines is a perfect

example. Publicly she presents
her situation as being the epitome

of financial solvency. Just this
morning she had her maid

carrying purchases out of
Emmaline's shop for all to see. Privately,

however, she's selling silver to
pay those bills and

many others."

"With
the
servants doing the actual selling," Aiden supplied,

watching her, noting the easy
smile on her face. It was

serene and yet somehow bursting
with life and energy.

"Of course. She has
appearances to maintain. If the selling

somehow becomes public knowledge,
she can always

claim that she knew nothing of it
and have the servants

charged with theft."

"A
rather
low tactic," he observed, leaning his shoulder

against a shelf support and
crossing his arms over his chest.

Damn if she wasn't fascinating to
watch. She didn't touch

things, she caressed and cajoled
them.

"To the Rose Walker-Hineses
of
this
world, appearances

often matter more than
loyalty,'"
she explained, apparently

unaware
of
his appraisal. “It’s a
lesson
Mohan is
finding
particularly

difficult
to
understand.
Pretensions are quite foreign

to
his
native
philosophies."

He disagreed; so far Mohan had
given him the impression

of being quite wedded to
pretenses. But he knew better than to

share that
view.
Alex Radford tended to be a
bit protective
of

her
tyrannical
charge
.
"
Philosophies?"
he
repeated,
deciding

it might
be
a
safer topic of conversation. "He has more than

one?"

She
nodded
and went on with
her
rearranging.
"Hinduism

is a complex and ever-so-flexible
system of beliefs and practices.

We
maintain one steadfast
religious prohibition in this

household though and that's regarding
the consumption of

beef. If
you
find
yourself
yearning
for
it. you
'
ll
have
to
dine

out. Other than that concession,
my objective is to make Mohan's

daily life as English as
possible."

"How
does
he like it?"

"He's a typically tolerant
child. With the typical Indian

view of the world."

"Enlighten me as to what
that might be," he pressed, genuinely

curious, genuinely liking-to his
surprise-the sound

of her voice.

She pursed her lips for a moment
as though concentrating

and then smiled serenely.
"In its simplest form ... The universe-

and all that's in it-is in a
constant state of change.

What there is, is and there is
nothing more at the moment.

What comes, comes. What goes,
goes. Within that acceptance,

one can shape one's destiny for
the next lifetime

through the exercise of good
thoughts, words, and deeds. The

tasks, lessons, and challenges of
this lifetime are set at birth,

determined by the actions of the
life lived before, and thus inescapable."

"Sounds rather fatalistic to
me," he confided.

"Only on the surface."

He drew a deep breath and stepped
out on a limb. "Do

you subscribe to that
perspective?"

She laughed. Softly, lightly. And
like her whisper in the

upstairs hall, it washed over
him, igniting his senses. "I'm

British," she said, mercifully
not looking at him. "And like

all Britons, I believe that I'm
the complete master of my

own destiny. My task as the royal
tutor is to attempt to infuse

some of that perspective into
Mohan's Indian one."

"Is he learning?"

''There are good days and bad
days, Mr. Terrell."

As with all things. If he only
considered the last few minutes,

he could call it a very good day,
indeed. They seemed

to have stumbled on a way to
converse without outright conflict.

"Do you suppose you could
call me Aiden?" he asked,

trying to strengthen the tenuous
bridge. "When it's just the

two of us, of course. 'Mr.
Terrell' always makes me think my

father's about somewhere and that
possibility tends to make

me a bit nervous these
days."

"I'll give the matter some
thought," she replied. Her smile

brightened by a degree and she
slid a look his way. "I gather

he--your father-disapproves of
something you've done."

''There's an
understatement," he answered. Unwilling to

expand on the particulars, he
indicated the room's rear window

with a nod of his chin and
changed the subject. "Is that

the kitchen?"

She looked up from her silver to
gaze out the window.

"Yes," she said,
picking up a cloth and wiping her hands. Laying

it aside, she turned and walked
past him. saying, ''Come

along and I'll introduce you to
Preeya. She's our cook and

housekeeper."

There was only a few feet of
hallway between the door of

the silver room and the one that
led out into the rear yard and

the kitchen beyond. A brass coat
tree sat in the comer, laden

with various wraps, but she
didn't pause to take one of them.

She'd stepped outside when Aiden
felt the compunction to be

a gentleman. "Wouldn't
you
like
a shawl
or something?" he

called
after
her.
"
Tell me which you'd prefer
and
I'll bring it

along."

She
laughed
again, precluding
his need for a coat anytime

soon. "It
'
s
only a short distance
and it's really not all that

cold.
At
least not by Himalayan standards."

Expelling a hard breath to steady
himself, Aiden left the

wraps behind and hurried to catch
up. "I've heard that the

Himalayas are an especially
beautiful part of India," he offered

as he fell in beside her on the
cleanly swept Walkway.

"Is it true?"

''It's paradise. A bit closer to
the English version of it in the

warmer months, though. A good number
of the British military commanders spend their summers in the region to escape

the horrible temperatures of the
south. Winters are rather

snowy, of course. One has to
expect that in high mountains."

"Do you miss it?"

Her smile faltered, and despite
her effort to keep
it
in

place,
he
could
tell
it was now forced and empty, of any real

happiness.
He'd
inadvertently
hit upon
a
topic that
troubled

her
and
he regretted
it
immensely. He liked the relaxed

Alexandra Radford ever so much
better than
'
the wary, defensive

one.

"You're a man of a thousand
questions, Mr. Terrell," she

predictably replied as she
stepped ahead of him and seized

the kitchen door handle before he
could. "Preeya," she called

out as she entered
.
"I've
brought
someone to
meet
you."

And that was the last he
understood
of anything she said.

Alex Radford rattled
on
in
what
he presumed to be a flawless

stream of Indian, gesturing to
him and to a plumpish, short,

gray-haired woman working at the
stove. The woman-who

wore a pair of flat, heavily
embroidered fabric shoes and what

looked like a dozen yards of
draped cloth-abandoned her

cooking to face him, put her
hands together before her, bow

slightly,
and
say something that sounded like "Namastay."

He had no idea what it meant or
even if he'd heard it right

But returning the greeting seemed
to be the polite thing to do

and so he mimicked her. His
reward was a huge smile from

her and an approving nod from
Alex Radford.

And then they promptly ignored
him. Preeya went back to

stirring whatever was in her cook
pot and Alex went on talking

in
Indian. No, he
corrected himself, remembering a long ago

school lesson. The most commonly
spoken language in

India wasn't called Indian. That
would have been logical.

Hindi? Yes, that was it. They
called it Hindi. Of course, for all

he knew, she could have been
speaking
one of the less common

ones. His personal knowledge of
India was limited to

having once seen a set of
navigation charts for the Indian

Ocean.

And he knew just as little about
Indian cuisine. One thing

was certain, though, the scents
were sharp and strong in

Preeya's world. He couldn't
identify any of those swirling

around and seemingly through him.
Well, maybe except for

the hint of cinnamon and cloves
he was catching every now

and again. There were dried
peppers hanging on a string