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'I haven't been here since I was a child,' she said happily as they wandered through the lion house gazing in awe at the big cats. Since it was so late in the year most of the animals were inside, but when they climbed the Mappin Terraces, the polar bears were splashing in their pool. The big furry creatures looked benign but could be fiercer than wolves. As they stood watching them, Sven said casually:

'In spite of Tom's criticisms, we work very well together. You stand a good chance of fulfilling your father's ambition for you. What would you say to making it a permanent union?'

Sonya felt a glad rush of relief. So he was not going to abandon her and all her fears had been groundless, but what did he mean by permanent? She looked at him questioningly, but his face was expressionless and he seemed absorbed in watching the antics of the polar bear.

'You mean until after the Olympiad?' she hazarded.

'Longer than that.' He turned his head and as his eyes, vividly blue, met hers, an electric current passed between them making her spine tingle. He went on in the same even tone.

'It seems we have a problem. When Ingrid and I won at the winter sports, I was under age and we entered as a Swedish pair. But you are British.'

'Of course I am, but... Oh, I see.' She stared at him as an impossible idea occurred to her. 'D ... does it matter?'

'It will matter very much when it comes to selection for the Olympics. All competitors enter under their own flag.'

'Then we wouldn't be eligible,' she said almost with relief.

'That is the goal of your father's ambition,' he reminded her relentlessly.

'Yes, but...' She clasped her hands on the parapet.

'Couldn't you pretend to be British?'

'No. Sonya, please treat this seriously.'

She could not contemplate the alternative, there was only one way in which she could be accepted as Swedish, but surely Sven could not mean that?

'I'm sure Daddy wouldn't like me to skate for Sweden,' she declared.

'Your father would not care a damn so long as we won a gold medal.' Which was probably true.

'I could change my name,' she suggested desperately. 'Nobody need know who I really am.'

'My dear, do not be so naive. Half your build-up will be that you are Eliot Vincent's daughter. He would not like that fact suppressed, but there is a way in which you could change your name legitimately and solve the problem.'

He had turned his attention back to the bears, but Sonya could no longer mistake his meaning. He was proposing to her, but surely no proposal had ever been made so cold-bloodedly and for such a trivial reason. Controlling her rising wrath, she asked quietly:

'Are you suggesting that we should get
married
so that I can be considered Swedish?'

'That was my idea.'

She clenched her hands. 'But ... but neither of us wants to marry, do we? Such a union would be a mockery.'

'Not necessarily so.'

Sonya forced a laugh. The situation was bizarre, and yet deep within her was a stir of excitement. To be married to Sven, to have him always beside her, to experience his embraces ... but perhaps that did not come into it, it would be only a marriage of convenience.

'Really, Sven, you're truly dedicated.' She tried to speak lightly. 'To be prepared to take me on permanently for the sake of a skating championship is the height of fanaticism.'

'That is only one reason,' he returned, quite unruffled. 'There are others. Your father's health is precarious and you have no near relatives. He is worried about what will become of you and I should be able to protect and guard you, for you are not equipped to face the rough and tumble of everyday existence on your own. You would not find me an exacting husband, and I would allow you more liberty than your father does. If we turn professional our joint earnings would be enough to keep us in comfort if not luxury. It is worth considering, Sonya.'

The mention of money made her suspicious.

'And of course you've considered that I'm my father's heir,' she said sweetly.

He turned towards her with a flash of anger in his eyes, the first sign of emotion he had shown.

'Yes, I
have
considered that,' he spoke almost savagely. 'It is the biggest obstacle between us. I told your father I would not touch a penny of his money, and I will provide for my wife, but he persuaded me to allow you to accept a moderate income from him, which will be entirely your own. You are used to extravagances which I could not at present provide,' his eyes slid over her mink coat. 'I do not wish to deprive you of them, your own car for instance, but he will leave the bulk of his assets in trust for our children ... if we have any.'

'You seem to have settled everything to your satisfaction without consulting me,' Sonya said bitingly, striving to control her fury. Sven must have ingratiated himself very thoroughly with her father to win such confidence, though he was
a
near stranger and
a
foreigner, but Eliot had Been eager to trust him, having no one else to turn to. 'I'm to be handed over from paternal care into matrimonial bonds as if I were
a
cipher, without any will of my own. Isn't it just possible I'm capable of looking after myself?'

Her colour had risen, flushing her cheeks with a peach-like bloom, her eyes were wide and stormy and she looked beautiful. Sven surveyed her appreciatively and a gleam came into-his eyes, but all he said was:

'Your upbringing has made that impossible. You will be besieged by fortune-hunters and drop-outs with whom you will not be able to cope. Believe me, Sonya, if you will accept me, I shall consider myself a very lucky man.'

His natural reserve, his precise English made his pronouncements sound stilted and formal, and Sonya became more and more incensed.

'If I accept you!' she echoed. 'I'd be a fool if I did. You are a magnificent skater, Sven, but the ice rink is no colder than you are. I'd sooner marry a codfish!'

A flash of anger crossed his face, to be instantly suppressed.

'You did not find me cold when we returned from the dance.'

'When you made me drunk and took advantage of me?' she cried recklessly. 'Oh, of course you've got the normal masculine appetites and you're quite unscrupulous how you satisfy them!'

-Sven looked first startled and then amused.

'For a well brought up young lady you have the most peculiar ideas and a surprising vocabulary,' he remarked. 'But I am no beast, Sonya, and if I went a little far that night, I had provocation.'

'Exactly—blame it on me I'

'I am not blaming you, only excusing myself for my lack of self-control. It was to avoid any repetition of my lapse that I brought you to a public place to make my proposal.'

'Canny man,' Thomasina had said, who was used to dealing with unruly male desires. Sonya wished he had not been so circumspect. If they were alone and he had embraced her as he had done before, she could forget all her doubts and fears in the rapture of his arms. Or had it all been a fantasy? She could hardly credit that this cool aloof person was the same man who had kissed her so passionately. But this was the real Sven, who had told her he always calculated the result of his actions before he performed them, and there had been no suggestion of feeling in his proposal. It might have been a business deal, as possibly that was all it was to him.

She did not want an arranged marriage nor merely to be desired during his 'lapses'; she wanted romantic love of the sort described in books and plays, and Sven appeared to be as romantic as a calculating machine. That was what she had meant when she had called him a codfish.

Looking down at her clasped hands, she murmured;

'It would be different if you loved me.'

'Ah, so!' His face hitherto so impassive became alive with mockery. 'You are still a child at heart. You want sweet words, and all I give you is common sense which you cannot appreciate.' He swooped forward and took hold of her wrists, bringing her round to face him, his eyes probing hers.

'I adore you, Sonya.'

She shook her head. 'You should have started with that, not produced it as an afterthought; I don't believe you.'

'But of course I love you.'

She dropped her eyes as flame seemed to flicker in his.

'Of course you don't. You feel a momentary desire perhaps ...'

'What on earth's wrong with that? And what do you know about desire? It is part of loving, you know.'

'The baser part,' she said disdainfully, 'but I think you're pretending what you don't feel to get your own way.' She drew her hands away from his. 'I ... I couldn't marry you, Sven, I don't know you well enough, in fact I don't think I know you at all.'

'But, Sonya ...'

'Please, I don't want to hear any more.'

Silence fell between them broken by the splashing of the bears. A group of children ran past them, and Sonya watched them with unseeing eyes.

'Of course you'll have to find another partner,' she said dully. 'A Swedish one.'

'Obviously I would not make the same blunder twice.'

'But didn't you know ... at the beginning?'

'I did not think you would be so obdurate.'

He had counted upon her compliance and all his actions had been premeditated. His wish to partner her, his conversations with her father. Even perhaps his lovemaking. But the gain to him would seem to be small—the prestige of marrying Eliot Vincent's daughter? Or her father's money? She could not quite believe that he was mercenary, but his arrogant confidence in her surrender needled her. He believed she had so little will of her own he had only to beckon and she would come to him, and all the while he had been carrying on with another woman.

'I don't want to share you with Thomasina,' she said abruptly.

'Still harping on Tom? She is nothing to me, Sonya, but you are a little bit the dog in the manger. If you do not want me, why grudge me to Tom?'

Why indeed, but the conviction that he would go to the other girl for salve for his vanity was painful to her.

Watching her downcast face, he urged her: 'Take time to reconsider. We are committed to the Wembley Gala, you cannot miss that, nor can you tell your father we are going to split until he is stronger.'

'Of course not.' She was aware of a lightening of her spirits. The break with Sven would not occur for several weeks, and she had only to say the word and there need be no break at all. She was swayed by a terrible irresolution. Hitherto all her decisions had been made for her, but this, the most vital one, she had to make for herself. She glanced at Sven's unrevealing face. If only he had shown some tenderness, but he was like a schoolmaster, concerned for her welfare, but indifferent about her heart. She knew what her father would want her to do, and if she asserted her independence she might deal him a mortal blow. But she could not allow herself to be coerced into marriage, and Sven already seemed to regard her as his ... chattel ... She savoured the old-fashioned word. No, she could not submit herself to further tyranny and this time for life.

'Perhaps by the time the gala is over you will have changed your mind,' Sven said insinuatingly.

She looked at him defiantly. 'You mustn't count on that, Sven,' she cried feverishly. 'I'll never change my mind. My decision is final.'

He gave her an oblique glance and smiled. She knew he did not believe her.

Christmas
came, bringing a welcome break from skating. There were various festivities at the club, but Sonya did not attend any of them. Her father was downstairs again and she spent her evenings with him. Sven sent cards, but did not call, a neglect which puzzled Eliot. On Christmas night, when they sat in front of the fire, Sonya and Tessa on the rug, he in his chair, cracking nuts and drinking port, he said to her:

'I thought young Sven would have been round.'

'I expect he's something better to do,' Sonya told him listlessly. They had put in the minimum of practice time perfecting the gala programme, but Sven had been aloof and Thomasina much in evidence.

'Have you quarrelled?' Eliot asked, watching her anxiously.

'Oh no, but he sees enough of me while we're working.'

Her father cleared his throat. 'There's something I wanted to say to you about Sven.'

'I know, Daddy. He proposed to me and I rejected him.'

'So he bungled it,' Eliot said scornfully. 'I told him to let me handle it, but why in God's name did you turn him down?'

With her eyes on the leaping flames, Sonya told him:

'We don't love each other.'

'Oh, that's not important,' Eliot declared. 'You're
two healthy young people, love will come. We can't kid ourselves that I'll last much longer, Sonya, and I'd be much happier if I knew you were safe in his care.'

'Oh, Daddy, don't!' She turned to him and clasped his knees. 'You'll live for ages yet... if you're careful.'

He stroked her hair. 'Perhaps ... perhaps not. But what have you got against Sven? He's a fine young man, and he can't be physically distasteful to you or you couldn't skate with him. He regards you very highly. Most girls would jump at him.'

'Regard isn't love,' she said steadily. 'You loved my mother.'

His lined face softened. 'I did, but such love doesn't come to everybody. You might wait all your life for it and never find it.' He eyed her keenly. 'There isn't anybody else, is there? That young whipper-snapper who's been taking you out?'

'Oh no, no!' She laughed at the idea. Derek had never caused her heart to flutter.

'Then I won't despair,' Eliot said cheerfully. 'You'll be together for a long while yet, and love may come.'

Sonya hesitated, wondering if she dared tell him that their partnership was about to be broken, but she was loth to spoil the tranquillity of the evening, and her father still looked frail.

'You've a high opinion of Sven,' she observed, 'but I've reason to believe he's promiscuous.'

Her father stared at her, and then smiled. 'What a big word! So my little girl is learning about men's bad ways. But you must also learn to be tolerant. Sven, my child, is a virile young man, so naturally he has had affairs, but they'll cease when he marries. He's only human.'