I hated calling her my lady. If Mellyora had been my lady I should have boasted of my friendship with Lady St. Larnston but she would be Mellyora, not my lady, to me.

Mellyora, however, could never be Lady St. Larnston while this woman was alive.

"Don't stand there like a fool. Braid my hair. And don't pull. I warned you before."

She took the brush from me and, as she did, the bristles tore the skin of one of my fingers, making it bleed. I looked at it in dismay while she flung the brush across the room.

"Oh, you have been treated brutally!" she mocked. "And serve you right." Her eyes were wild. I thought: Shall we in a few years' time have Lady St. Larnston going out on the moor to dance when the moon is full?

They were doomed, these Derrises—doomed to madness by a monster. And Judith was one of the doomed.

A bitter anger was in me that night. I hated those who humiliated me, and Judith was humiliating me. I had better take care, she told me. She would get rid of me. She would choose her own maid. She was Lady St. Larnston now and there was no reason why she should be dictated to by anyone.

I suggested she have one of the soothing powders which Dr. Hilliard had prescribed for her and to my surprise she agreed. I gave it to her and the effect—in about ten minutes—was apparent. The storm was passing; docilely she allowed me to get her to bed.

I went back to my room and although it was late I dressed my hair in the Spanish fashion, putting in my comb and mantilla. This always soothed me and had become a habit with me. With my hair thus I would remember the ball and dancing with Kim and how he had told me I was fascinating. At the back of my mind was a dream that Kim came back and was fond of me. By some miracle he was the owner of the Abbas and we married and lived there happy ever after.

As I sat at the window looking out on the moonlight, I felt a desire to go out to the stones but I was tired. I took a book in order to soothe myself by reading, and propped myself up on my bed, fully dressed, because I wanted to leave the comb in my hair; reading never failed to comfort me, it reminded me how far I had come, and that I had achieved what most people would have said was impossible.

I read on and on and it was past midnight when I heard the sound of footsteps creeping to my room.

I sprang off the bed and blew out my candles. I was standing behind the door when Johnny opened it and came in.

This was a different Johnny. I did not know what had changed him, I only knew that I had never seen him like this before. He was quiet, serious; and there was a strange determination about him.

"What do you want?" I demanded.

He lifted a finger, warning me to keep quiet.

"Get out or I shall shout," I told him.

"I want to talk to you. I've got to talk to you."

"I have no desire to talk."

"You've got to listen. You've got to stand by me."

"I don't understand you."

He stood close to me and all the truculence had gone from him; he was like a child, pleading with me; and this was strange with Johnny.

"I'll marry you," he said.

"What!"

"I said I'd marry you."

"What game are you playing?"

He took me by the shoulders and shook me. "You know," he said. "You know. It's the price I'm ready to pay. I tell you I'll marry you."

"And your family?"

"They'll raise hell. But I say: To hell with the family. I'll marry you. I promise."

"I'm not sure that I will marry you."

"Of course you will. It was what you were waiting for. Kerensa, I'm serious ... never more deadly serious in my life. I don't want to marry. There'll be trouble. But I tell you I'll marry you."

"It's not possible."

"I'm going to Plymouth."

"When?"

"Tonight... . No ... it's already morning. Today, then, I'm catching the first train. I'm leaving at five. Are you coming with me?"

"Why this sudden decision?"

"You know. Why pretend?"

"I think you're mad."

"I've always wanted you. And this is the way. Are you coming with me?"

"I don't trust you."

"We've got to trust each other. I'll marry you. I'll get the special license. I swear it."

"How do I know ...'?"

"Look. You know what's happened. We'll be together. Once it's done, it's done. I'll marry you, Kerensa."

"I want time to think about it."

"I'll give you till four. Be ready. We're leaving then. I'm going to pack some things. You do the same. Then we'll take the trap to the station ... in time for the train."

"This is madness," I said.

He caught me to him and I could not understand the embrace he gave me; it was made up of desire, passion, and perhaps hatred. "It's the way you want it. It's the way I want it."

Then he left me.

I sat by the window. I thought of the humiliation of the evening. I thought of the fulfillment of my dream. It could come true the way I had dreamed it.

I wasn't in love with Johnny. But some sensuality in him touched something in me. I was meant to marry and bear children—children who would be St. Larnstons.

Already the dream was becoming more ambitious. Justin and Judith had no child. I saw my son: Sir Justin. I, the mother of the heir to the Abbas!

Anything was worth while for that. Marriage with Johnny—anything.

I sat down and wrote a letter to Mellyora; I enclosed one which I asked her to give to Granny.

I had made up my mind.

So I left on the five-o'clock train for Plymouth.

Johnny was as good as his word, and shortly afterwards I became Mrs. Johnny St. Larnston.

4

The days that followed our flight from the Abbas still seem something like a dream to me; and it was only weeks afterwards when I returned to the Abbas as Mrs. St. Larnston, needing all my strength to fight for the place I intended to have, that life took on reality.

I was not afraid on the day we returned; there was scarcely any room for any feeling but triumph. It was Johnny who was afraid; I was to learn that I had married a weakling.

During that early morning journey to Plymouth I had made my plans. I was determined not to return to the Abbas until I was Mrs. St. Larnston, and I was determined to return to the Abbas. I need not have worried. Johnny made no attempt to evade his promise; in fact he seemed as eager for the ceremony as I was, and was even prepared to keep his distance until it was over; and then we had a few days" honeymoon in a Plymouth hotel.

Honeymooning with Johnny was an experience I do not particularly care to recall even now. Ours was a partnership purely of the senses. I had no real love for him, nor he for me. Perhaps he had a grudging admiration for my tenacity; there were times when I believed he was glad of my strength; but ours was a physical relationship which for those first weeks was satisfying enough for us not to examine too closely the situation in which we had put ourselves.

For me this was the culmination of my most cherished dream; and out of these dreams had grown a new and more ambitious one—I longed passionately for a child; my whole body cried out for a child! A boy who would be the heir of St. Larnston—my son, a baronet. During those days and nights in the Plymouth hotel, when for Johnny and me there seemed to be no meaning in life beyond our passion, I was wildly and hilariously happy because I sensed a growing power within me. I could make my dreams come true. I was determined to conceive without delay; I could not wait to hold my son in my arms.

I did not tell Johnny of this; aware of my need which equaled his for me, he completely misconstrued my passion; but it ignited his and he repeated to me often his pleasure in me. "I regret nothing ... nothing," he cried; and he laughed, reminding me of my aloofness towards him. "You're a witch, Kerensa," he told me. "I always believed you were. That Grandmother of yours is one and you're the same. All the time you were as mad for me as I was for you although you treated me as if you loathed me. What about that parson now, eh?"

"Don't be too sure of yourself, Johnny," I warned him.

And he laughed at me and made love to me and I would never hold back because I would say to myself: Perhaps my son will be conceived now.

Johnny could abandon himself to the moment without thought of the future; I understood later that this characteristic was the source of all his troubles. During those weeks in Plymouth we were the newly married couple reveling in the possession of each other; he did not give a thought to our return until the day before we left for the Abbas.

Johnny had written to his brother telling him that we were returning and asking that Polore be sent to the station to meet us.

I shall never forget stepping out of the train. I was wearing a traveling suit of green velours cloth trimmed with black braid; and my bonnet was of a matching green with black ribbons. Johnny had bought these clothes for me and he declared that in the appropriate garments, which he intended I should have, I should put Judith in the shade.

Johnny seemed to hate his family, but I understood that was because at this time he was afraid of them. It was typical of Johnny to hate what he feared. Sometimes he would make allusions to our relationship which baffled me. I had forced him to this step, he told me, but he didn't think he was going to be sorry after all. We understood each other. We would stand by each other; and we had learned, had we not, that we were necessary to each other?