Part 10 (1/2)
As she walked across the Salon to where at the end of it the servants had laid out a card-table and packs of cards, she knew that William's eyes were following her resentfully.
Sir Roderick, however, summed up the situation and engaged William in a conversation about horses.
Soon they were talking together by the fireside in a manner which precluded them, Astara knew, from hearing anything that she and Lionel said to each other.
She was not surprised when as they sat down at the table he shuffled the cards, then said: ”Shall I tell your fortune?”
”Are you a soothsayer?”
”Only where you are concerned.”
”Then I think perhaps my fate should be left a secret until I meet a Gypsy. I am sure there were plenty at the Horse Fair who would have been able to predict my future.”
”I can do that,” he answered.
Astara looked amused and he said: ”You are standing at the cross-roads and you can go either right or left, but whichever way you turn it will be irrevocable and you will be unable to change your mind.”
”Do you think I would wish to?”
”If you found you had made a mistake.”
”I hope I shall not do that.”
”It is very easy to do when someone is as lovely as you.” He spoke seriously as if he was not paying her a compliment but was really warning her.
”I love you, Astara!” he went on. ”You are well aware of that, but I know I have little chance of your accepting me as a husband.”
”Why should you say that?”
”Because I have always come off second best and that, I suppose, is what I shall continue to do.”
”Are you referring to William?”
”Who else? I know what he was saying to you when we came into the room just now.”
”Was it so obvious?”
”It was to me, and he has done everything possible to put me out of the running.”
”How could he do that?”
Lionel smiled.
”I am not a sneak, Astara, nor would I try to win you in an unfair manner. But I love you and I think you are the most beautiful person I have ever seen in my life!”
”Thank you,” Astara said, ”but I do not think that beauty is really a foundation on which one can build a marriage. There is so much more to it than that. ”
Lionel thought for a moment, then he said: ”I think you are inferring that one should have brains, but I am not a brainy chap like the other Worfields.” He paused before he said: ”To tell the truth, my father was so clever and always trying to push me into being the same, that I hated every-thing they tried to make me learn at Eton.”
”I can understand that,” Astara said. ”My father always said the most fatal thing where children are concerned is to try to force one's own enthusiasms on them.”
”Your father was an understanding man. I used to go through agonies every term when I went home for the holidays knowing there would be a row as soon as I arrived over my school report. ”
”And the rows did not make you work any harder? ”
”Of course not! It just made me dig my toes in and decide that knowledge - all knowledge was a bore!” Astara laughed.
”I can somehow see you defying your father and your teachers and putting a barrier between you and everything they wanted you to learn.”
”You understand, ” Lionel said. ”I a.s.sure you I suffered a great deal because of the cleverness of the Worfield family. ”
There was something boyish in the admission which made Astara say : ”I am really sorry for you.”
”You cannot think what it was like, ” Lionel said, ”having fast Uncle Roderick, then Uncle George held up to me as s.h.i.+ning examples and, eventually of course, William. ”
”Is William clever?” Astara enquired.
”He was always the top of the form in one way or another.”
”What do you mean by that ?”
There was a little pause, then Lionel replied : ”Forget what I said.”
”If you ask me to,” Astara agreed. ”So William was top not only at games Uncle Roderick told me that but also scholastically.”
”He always went home with a prize, ” Lionel said, ”but all I had to show of my progress were several extremely painful floggings !”
Astara laughed light-heartedly.
”Poor Lionel ! You really make me sorry for you. At the same time I am sure you have made up for it since you grew up.
”I love being in the Regiment, but that does not prevent my father from shaking his head and saying he had hoped to have a son who would s.h.i.+ne as he did in the political world.”
”It would be impossible to have two orators in the family! Astara laughed.
”That is what I have always thought myself,” Lionel remarked, ”and that brings us back to the beginning, Astara..”
He looked across the table at her as he said with all sincerity: ”I cannot tell you in a lot of fancy words what I think about you. I can only say that I love you and it would be hie reaching Heaven to be married to you. But I have a feeling you are not going to open the gates.”
”It is too soon for me to make up my mind,” Astara said firmly, ”about anything.”
”And when you , do, it will undoubtedly he William,” Lionel said with a sudden note of bitterness in his voice. ”I do not need to look at the cards of your hand to foresee that.”
”I was thinking when I looked at the picture over the mantelpiece, ” Astara said, ”that the three G.o.ddesses who appeared before Paris all attempted to influence his decision by offering him alluring promises.”
Lionel looked towards the picture, but she could see it meant nothing to him.
”Athene,” Astara went on, ”promised Paris that he would always be victorious in battle. ”
”Did she, by Jove?” Lionel exclaimed. ”That would be worth having, and I suppose by battle she did not only mean a fight on a battlefield.”