Winds in the Wilderness

WINDS IN THE WILDERNESS Rosalind Brett

When Lou and Nadine and Daphne went to spend six months on Nadine's farm in Mlemba, they intended to be self-sufficient. But the nearest farm was a bachelor set-up, and when men and women are neighbours, things are bound to start happening. Most of the happenings at Four Winds centred on masterful Damon Thorpe. Nadine liked his conversation and Daphne his looks, but it was Lou, the youngest, who was destined to feel the full impact of his personality.

CHAPTER I NADINE switched off the engine of the grimy little jeep, crossed both her arms on the wheel and stared. "Great heavens," she murmured soberly. "Six thousand miles ... for this?" Daphne's voice quavered. "It's too bad. I'm horribly tired and those beastly roads have shaken my bones from their sockets. And then you have to take the wrong road into the bargain. This can't possibly be the place, Nadine." "I assure you it is," said Nadine hollowly. "We are exactly three and a half miles beyond Mlemba, and those peeling letters on that poor, besotted gate spell Four Winds. Four Winds," she repeated bitterly. "Why didn't we guess that a house with a name like that wouldn't know which way to lean? " As a matter of fact the walls were fairly perpendicular, even if they were constructed of corrugated iron. The roof, though, had a sad and rakish air. The thatch was sparse and gnawed here and there into holes, and the single chimney let through sunshine between the bricks. From the cracks in the stone veranda pushed prickly pear and milk bush, and some kind of creeper had taken root in the accumulation of dust between the slats of the shutters which covered the windows. The bungalow gave the impression of yearning for the rain which would nourish the growth in which it was endeavouring to blanket itself before decaying gracefully into the soil. As for the farm lands of which the house was monarch, they stretched, flat, bush-grown and unproductive, to a belt of blue gums which gave out half-way up the side of a low, rocky mountain. Sere grass everywhere between those bushes, except for a patch of brown mealie stalks from last year's crop.

The heavy silence in the jeep was broken by a laugh from the back, which was instantly stifled. Nadine turned. "Really, Lou, this is no time ..." She broke off and her narrow, reddened lips forced into an unwilling smile, which graduated into one of pure amusement. "Of course!" she exclaimed. "Lou's right. It is funny. Here we were, expecting to be greeted by a colonial mansion set among exotic trees and a string of African servants falling over themselves to carry our bags and brew tea - and what do we find?" "A shanty!" supplied Daphne broodingly. "That uncle of yours must have been crazy." "I like it," said Lou. Two pairs of eyes came round to regard her: one pair blue and hostile, the other dark brown and indulgent. "She likes it," Nadine told Daphne with a kindly nod. "That's one of us, anyway. Since you like it," she said to Lou, "perhaps you'll take the key and risk the place falling about your ears when the door opens. Look out for snakes!" Lou climbed past the suitcases and big coats, stepped out with relief into the sunshine, took another look at Four Winds, and still liked it. Small, decrepit and square against the hot blue sky, it threw out a challenge. And Lou wasn't up to her eyebrows in a career like Nadine, or recovering from an abortive love affair, like Daphne. Lou was free and untrammelled, and so wholeheartedly glad to be in Rhodesia that the challenge was merely exhilarating. She stepped along the weed-grown path, went up two cement steps into a porch rippled like the desert with sand. The key fitted into the lock and turned with a savage, grating sound. She pushed, saw a large spider scurry, enraged, across a worn rug near the door, and

walked into the living room which had belonged for twenty years to Nadine's uncle. Blurred pencils of light barred the room through the festooned shutters, and when her eyes became inured to the dimness Lou saw a couple of baggy armchairs, a plain wood table and four Windsor chairs, a home-made cupboard with drawers at the top and, under the window, a small inlaid writing table which breathed elegance even through the eight months' thickness of dust. That writing table had a history, thought Lou; probably a sentimental one for poor Uncle Simon Gardner. "My, my," breathed Nadine, just behind her. "What a glorious end for a poet. Let it be a lesson to you, Lou, my poppet. Never lose that nice red head of yours in the clouds." "It looks horrid in here now," Lou conceded, "but I expect it was a comfy room when he lived here. Men don't notice the lack of ornamentation, and a poet would be even more immune. I'm glad we brought a set of his books with us." "You're not suggesting," said Daphne in sombre tones, "that we live in this hut?" "Of course we're staying here. That's what we came for." Lou's grey eyes anxiously scanned Nadine's face. "You do agree, don't you, Nadine? We can't run to the cost of living at a hotel while this place is done up, and that shop in Mlemba did promise to deliver the divan and camp-bed this afternoon. Tidying up the place will be the greatest fun in the world." "Fun," echoed Nadine. "Do you hear that, Daphne darling? Fun!" "If it's all the same to you," said Daphne thinly, "I'll treat myself to a few nights at the last hotel we passed, while you burrow."

Lou had gone through a doorway, discovered a bedroom furnished on a par with the living room, another room which was empty and a green-painted kitchen which had a wood stove set in a recess under the chimney opening. She twisted the key in the lock of the back door and flung it wide to let air and light into the oven-hot, dustsmelling abode. There was an iron sink with a pump handle at one side of it, a scarred enamel-top table, with a cupboard under it which held an assortment of saucepans and a black kettle. Another cupboard, fixed to the wall, contained some thick cups? saucers and plates, a few pieces of cutlery and a brown earthenware teapot. Happily, Lou grabbed at a folded tea towel which lay upon the pile of plates and tucked one end of it into the belt of her frock, forming an apron. She looked into the living room. "I'm going to get our box of supplies and the spirit stove from the car. Dust off a chair or two and sit down, and in no time I'll bring you a cup of tea. After that we'll wade in so thoroughly that even Daphne won't want to miss a night here." And that was how Nadine Gardner, Daphne Pryce and Lou Meredith came to live at Four Winds in the district of Mlemba, which lay to the north-west of Bulawayo. Nadine had been left the house and lands by her uncle who, a minor man of letters, had realised that she was the only other member of the Gardner family with talent. In his will he had asked, but not commanded, that she live there for six months and try to turn out something better than the sophisticated drawings to which he had seen her name attached in various magazines. Nadine, thirty, svelte and darkly beautiful, had cocked an eyebrow at the eccentric will. The truth was she didn't want to turn out anything better. Her work was always in demand and also there was a flattering prestige

attached to her position. She enjoyed life in a service flat and didn't a bit mind living up to her income. For a few months she got a kick out of mentioning "my African farm". The fact that she knew no details whatever of the place rather enhanced it as a subject for conjecture, but she was too busy to give deep thought to it. She had seen pictures of some of the lovely farmhouses in the Bulawayo and Salisbury districts and formed the impression that Four Winds would be the same thing on a smaller scale. Some time, she had decided eventually, she must sell the farm. Then, at the end of the London winter, she had caught a chill and it had been the dickens of a job to struggle back to the grind. Lou, that stubborn child who looked no more substantial than a willow sapling, had harped on the climate of Rhodesia and the benefits of a sea trip. "Just go and see Four Winds," she had coaxed. "It's inhuman to set about selling the farm without seeing it first. And take lots of snaps of it for us. You'll come back bursting with energy and ideas." Nadine was nearly in a condition to give in, but not quite. It had taken Daphne's mistaken plunge into the fiery cauldron called love to complete the resolve. Daphne was a model in an exclusive dressmaking establishment. She was also the figure Nadine used when she needed to draw someone exceptionally pretty and well- proportioned — which was often. Daphne had fallen so fatally for a certain rich business man that one couldn't help but pity her when he had made public his engagement to someone else. Poor Daphne had dropped straightaway into a vacuum in which nothing mattered. She had worked badly and often spent a whole day in bed for no other reason than that life was too much trouble.

When the man's wedding date was announced in several daily papers, Nadine acted. She took a taxi out to a small house in a quiet avenue at the far end of Hampstead, and there she begged Charles Meredith to allow Lou to make the trip to Africa. "It won't cost a lot, Charles," she had said firmly. "Only her fare. I know Lou always seems to be happy enough looking after you, but it's no life for a girl of twenty. You must see that. Besides, if she's not here, you'll feel better about marrying Mrs. Camfield. Don't think I blame you for that — she's a charming person — but ever since Lou left school she's been running the house, and she'd be bound to feel it if she were pushed aside," Giving him no time to retort, she added, "In the six months Lou will be away, your new wife can become entrenched. You're my cousin, Charles," she had ended with a smile, "and I've always been fond of you, but if -you do anything to prevent Lou going with Daphne and me, I'll disown you for ever." His answer had been, "Take her with you, by all means. In her way she's as self-reliant as you are, so I shan't have many qualms." And with the ghost of a wink, "Don't set out to be a fond aunt, Nadine; you'll find her looking after you, instead." Days elapsed before Lou really believed in her luck. She was breathless with wonder and terribly relieved because, to be honest, she was a little afraid of Netta Camfield, and desperately apprehensive of the day when she would enter the Meredith household as its mistress. She resigned from her post at the local library, ran up shorts and summer frocks on the old machine in the kitchen, did her own and Nadine's packing, and even made most of the necessary enquiries at the shipping office. For Daphne, who was almost too spent to throw her wonderful clothes into a trunk, she knew a profound pity. Before then Lou had always regarded love as something to look forward to;

a warm thrill of anticipation, friendship with a mounting, heady excitement and then a hazy but glorious climax in which a man thought you the most wonderful woman in the world, and you had similar but more palpitating thoughts about him. But Daphne's experience was definitely chilling. If a man could make love to a woman of blonde good looks and much intelligence — a woman, moreover, who would make an excellent wife for a business magnate — and yet turn almost blindly towards an older woman of plain appearance the moment she showed up on his horizon, then the male species was of the less comprehensible than Lou had imagined. It was safer not to have too much to do with it. She had enjoyed the men passengers on the boat, though, and had lots of secret amusement from their advances to Nadine and Daphne. Nadine was superb with men; a good listener and a better talker, with that faint cheerful sarcasm which so often brought a smile to masculine lips. Lou had always loved and admired Nadine, and in a way she was also fond of Daphne. Probably through her profession, Daphne was too physically conscious of herself. It had become more natural to her to pose than to be normal, and she couldn't bear to obscure the fair, silken hair by a turban or disguise her winsome curves in a print overall. Consequently it was Lou who did most of the dirty work at Four Winds during those first days. While she washed and painted the plywood walls of the rooms, Nadine amused herself with her palette, making large pictures of birds and flowers on the matt white doors; she was one of those rare people who can accept as gracefully as they give and, having no flair for housework and knowing that Lou would never be capable of voicing all the gratitude she felt, she let her young cousin scrub and polish till she was ready to melt.

Daphne, for all her initial antipathy to the house and its stored dust, was by no means idle. In a frilly, polka-dot apron, and with a ribbon about her hair, she looked much younger than her twenty-four years, and a little happier besides, while she stitched up the rents in the curtains, or made the regular pots of tea. It was grand, Lou found, to break off from clearing down the bookshelves or repairing a kitchen chair, to drink tea with the others in the shabby but already familiar little living room. She would pull off the scarf which bound the red-gold hair, dab away the sweat which had gathered at each temple, and spread herself out on the floor. The two easy chairs, of course, were Nadine's and Daphne's; Nadine had already branded her own with paint-stains from her smock. "You know," said Lou contentedly one morning, over elevenses, "we may become so attached to this place that we'll never want to leave it." "Lord" - from Daphne - "what an outlook! The three old maids of Four Winds. I believe the locals already think we're touched." "Are there any locals?" asked Nadine interestedly. "I've seen Africans trudging by, but no white people. There must be neighbouring farms, though." Daphne nodded. "There's a man who goes by in a big tourer yesterday there were two of them in it. They slowed and stared at this delectable dwelling." "They'd stare harder if they saw the inmates. We'll never have room to entertain, thank goodness." Nadine took a packet of cigarettes from her pocket and offered them. "I expect there's a club at Mlemba. You two ought to join."

"Why not you, as well?" demanded Lou. "It would be exciting to have somewhere to go at weekends." "Exciting - among farmers and government officials? You're so refreshing, Lou." "They probably have womenfolk. Besides, what's wrong with farmers? That's what we'd be if we stayed on here. We can-t shut ourselves away from everyone, and settlers are friendly. The man Daphne saw in the tourer, for instance; one day he may stop here." "He did stop here," said Daphne. "This morning." "Oh?" Nadine puffed out smoke and stared at her. "Why keep it up your sleeve?" Daphne gave a small grin. "Don't worry. He was pleasant to start with, but froze when I told him we were three women. His name is Damon Thorpe, and he lives at a farm called Redlands, which is about five miles farther on up the road. He talks as if he's a planter, but I don't somehow think he is. One of those very lean men - you know, looks as if he exists on coffee and cigarettes, but is awfully strong. I think he only pulled up because I was near the front gate and he considered it his duty." "How did he look at you?" enquired Nadine. "No hunger?" "Not a scrap." "Good. That probably means he's married." "He isn't. Apparently the man he was with yesterday lives with him. The other's a little older."

"Two bachelors!" Nadine's smooth brow rose. "Let's hope they're both woman-shy. The only husband we're hunting is a sweet boy for Lou — and that can wait a while, too." They laughed and drank their tea. Lou was flat on the rug with her face between her hands. She looked up at the pure, half-humorous lines of Nadine's face and put a question she had put before, in different words, without gaining a satisfactory answer. "Why do you always speak as if you'll never marry, Nadine?" The other considered. "Probably because that's the way I feel," she said. "Some women need marriage more than others. I was lucky enough to get my first break with a magazine editor before I left Art School, and since then I've been increasingly busy. Emotionally, my life has been uncomplicated, and I'm glad." "You expect us to believe that at your age you've never had a heartthrob?" scoffed Daphne; unexpectedly, she added, "Everyone needs" someone to love, but I suppose it doesn't have to be one of the opposite sex. The trouble is that once you've allowed yourself to believe marriage is your destiny, life isn't worth having without it." "You'll marry," Nadine said confidently. "You're over the first phase of heartache already." "But you, Nadine," Lou persisted. "My father always said you should marry someone very clever, but I don't agree. I think you should marry someone masterful, who'd make you give up working." "The man doesn't exist who could do that! I'm fond of you and Daphne," she said tersely, "and I serve the public. To love and to serve, they say, is the complete existence. It's all I want. A man would be in the way."

"I envy you," sighed Daphne. "More tea?" The pot was drained and they returned to their various tasks. Lou was painting the window-frame in Nadine's room while its occupant worked at some sketches in the narrow veranda, and Daphne was preparing to cook the only dish at which she was really good — French omelette. It was nearly lunch time when a very black Rhodesian boy knocked at the back door. Daphne opened the door and went cold. She stepped back and called "Lou!" in a frightened croak. The boy gave Lou a wide, confiding and very white smile. "Master send me," he said. "I work for you." "But we don't need anyone," she told him. "I do anything. Mend roof, clean the house, make the garden. Master send me," he repeated, as if this were the final word on any subject. "Which master?" "Big master at Redlands." Lou consulted Nadine. A hefty African would be an immense help, they both conceded, and it would be as well to get the roof repaired, even though this was the dry season. After all, if they were hoping eventually to sell the place it had to be made waterproof and attractive. It wouldn't hurt to plan a bit of a garden, too. They might make his wages on the selling price. So James, whose surname began with four consonants and was consequently unpronounceable by the three English women, obligingly went off, first to cut straw to dry out-for the roof, and then to bring his battered suitcase and blanket to the servant's hut at the back of the house.

They were settling in like bees into a hive, thought Lou happily, a few days later. The roof had been patched up and, at her suggestion, the whole of it had been treated to a new layer of thatch to avoid the leprous look. The outer walls, though the even undulations could not be masked, nevertheless were smartened considerably by a coat of cream paint, and the rotting veranda posts were replaced by new ones, painted green, like the low rail and guttering. To Lou it was a dear little house, and she couldn't have chosen better companions. She was so glad it was possible for them all to sleep separately. Nadine, naturally, had to have the best room to herself, and the second bedroom was made neat and clean for Daphne. Lou slept on the camp-bed in a room of attic proportions which was also the bathroom, ironing room and linen room. Her clothes were in Daphne's cupboard, but her small treasures and photographs had to remain in the case in which she had brought them down the East Coast of Africa, and by road in the jeep from Durban. When the lunch was cleared she often went for a walk. There were footpaths through the scrubland of stunted acacia and marula that led into quite a dense little forest which, presumably, belonged to Nadine. Here it was cool, except where a blade of sunshine pierced the dimness, and the ground was iron-hard with dryness. The rains had finished a couple of months ago and even the reeds in the dry streambeds had wilted and dropped their heads into the red earth. Not much of the farm had ever been cultivated, though there were long, flat sandy stretches which ought, surely, to produce something worthwhile. What was it they grew hereabouts - coffee, tobacco, tea? Lou wished she knew. She was thinking quite deeply about it one afternoon as she came back to the house. That was why she started so violently as she entered the living room and found herself confronted by a tall man who looked as if he couldn't smile if he

tried. A man in the house reduced its size considerably. He was totally out of place and seemed to know it. "Good afternoon," he said abruptly. "Seeing that there's neither a bell nor a knocker I came inside and tried to make myself heard. You're not Miss Gardner, are you?" "No. I expect Nadine's working in her room. Are you Mr. Thorpe?" "I am. It's merely a conventional call. I knew Simon Gardner and thought I ought to make myself known to his niece. It doesn't matter, though." "But it does," she said hastily. "Please sit down and I'll tell Nadine you're here." She turned and nearly fell over a huge dictionary. He moved quickly and picked it up. "I beg your pardon. I dropped .that purposely, to see if I could shake some life into the place." She laughed suddenly, her small nose with the freckles across the bridge crinkled and the grey eyes took a sudden sparkle. "It's funny your standing in here throwing the dictionary about. They must be very fast asleep." The ghost of a smile came into his greenish-blue glance. "You're the youngest, aren't you - the one who gives James his orders? He called you the little missus." "James is a gem. We haven't thanked you for him - but, well ... we rather got the impression you didn't want us to." "We're lending him to you for as long as you stay. What's your name? " "Lou Meredith."

"Louise or Louisa?" "Louise," she answered, wondering if it mattered. She looked up at him enquiringly. "You hated having to come here and see Nadine, didn't you?" "What if I did?" he said coolly. "I've often been compelled to do things I hate." "I can't imagine that. People who dislike doing the polite thing by others are usually accustomed to having their own way. The reason I mentioned it is that Nadine won't mind if you're the kind who can't be bothered with women. She doesn't want to be bothered with men, either." The thinnish brown face took a sardonic cast. "What devastating frankness. Are you her bodyguard, or merely a child anxious to please the person who brought you here?" She hardened slightly. "I was trying to be helpful, to both of you, but chiefly to Nadine. She's the only one of us who has work to do, and to get on with it she has to have peace and quiet. But she'll be happy to see anyone who knew her uncle." "I'll come some other time," he said, moving towards the open door. "Oh, dear. I've offended you, haven't I?" He paused, looking her over with dispassionate curiosity, "I'm never offended. In my job one takes human nature as one finds it. I've got out of the way of seeing everything from a personal viewpoint." Something drove Lou to ask, "What is your job? Don't you belong here? " "I'm a U.N. official in Malawi," he answered briefly.

"On leave?" He nodded. "Six months - practically four of them still to go." "Then ... then Redlands . . ." "Is mine," he finished for her, with a dismissive shrug. "Please tell Miss Gardner I'll look in again some time." "If you'll only climb down and wait a minute," she exclaimed in exasperation, "I'll call Nadine." "You needn't call, my pet," came even, ironic tones from the inner doorway. "I guessed we had a visitor, but I was taking a bath. Forgive me for being so long about it, but in our bathroom one has to be something of a contortionist and very patient. I expect you're Damon Thorpe, who supplied the invaluable James, who, in turn, supplies us with your milk. How do you do?" Trust Nadine to soothe the man into taking a chair and lighting a cigarette. Lou looked at his crisp, dark brown hair, at the strong bony fingers holding the cigarette, and at the immaculate crease in his khaki shorts; so this was a U.N. official from the tropics. Seated, he was still too big for the room. "I'll make some tea," she said, and escaped. He was their first visitor and there wasn't a cake in the house. Nadine didn't care for cakes and Daphne never varied her strict diet, so Lou did without them because baking cost money and her existence here was justified by their low cost of living. The water had boiled and she was filling the pot when Daphne drifted in, fresh in stiff yellow voile and with a white ribbon in her hair. Daphne had been sleeping and the blue eyes had the untroubled lustre of a babe's.

"I'm not late," she said. "Why are you making the tea?" Lou explained. "And we haven't a scone or a cake in the cupboard and not even a decent sandwich filling." "He doesn't look a cake-eater. Why only two cups?" "He's come to see Nadine. We'll have ours in here." "I certainly won't!" Daphne bridled. "The man's the only interesting thing that's happened in the fortnight we've been here. I'm going to make the most of it." Unnecessarily she patted her sleek curls and the skirt of her dress. "I'll take the tray." For the first minute or two she was alone Lou had the uneasy conviction that Damon Thorpe would dub her ungracious; oddly, she didn't want him to do that. On the other hand he might consider, as she did, that a third woman in the tiny living room was a bit too much of a good thing, and the other two were so good-looking that Lou would be the flop of anticlimax. She would rather be Cinderella in the kitchen. Twenty minutes later he left. Lou heard them at the front door; then a car started up and swished away down the gravel road. She walked round to the front of the house and came upon Nadine, leaning against a veranda post, while Daphne sat in one of the sagging grass chairs. Nadine was smiling. "I don't see why we shouldn't accept all the assistance he's willing to give us," she said musingly. "In fact, it's an intriguing situation. He'll improve the farm for us and we'll eventually sell it to him." "He didn't say he would buy," objected Daphne.

"He will, though. He admitted he offered to buy it from Uncle Simon when he was here on leave three years ago." "He's not the acquisitive sort," stated Daphne definitely. "He bought Redlands for somewhere to live when he finishes his time in Malawi. He said outright that his reason for offering to buy from your uncle was a desire to get him to return to England for medical treatment." "That's so." Nadine stroked her long, fine jaw. "He's a strange sort of a man — and apparently somewhat of a paradox." "In a way he's like you." "Like me!" "Self-sufficient," nodded Daphne, "and with something about him that puts a woman on her mettle. He's not quite like any man I've ever met." Lou, resting against the outside of the low veranda wall, looked at Daphne and remembered her misery in London and complete apathy towards men on the boat. Now, her lovely skin was slightly flushed and the faint droop had gone from her mouth. It was about seven weeks since she had been torn with anguish and disillusionment. Nadine had prophesied that her recovery would take the best part of a year, but Lou's calculations put it at much less. Daphne Pryce was already putting the past well behind her. Nadine was saying, "I hope you're not suggesting there's something about me which puts a man on his mettle!" "Not any man, perhaps, but you might have that effect on his kind." "Use your wits, darling. He dwells womanless in the wilds, and the only feminine things he does come across are the stalwart wives of

missionaries — at least, I expect so. What he looks for in a woman is relaxation, and he wouldn't get that crossing swords with me. You're much more his little dish of delight, thank the stars. How would you like to be a U.N. officer's wife, Daphne?" "It's hot enough here - I couldn't stand up to Malawi. But he certainly gives Mlemba an atmosphere. He has a sort of acid charm." A pause. "I wonder what the other man is like?" "Prosaic, I'd say. It would take a stolid man to live with Damon Thorpe for six months and remain his friend." Nadine bent and gave a tug at the rough red-gold locks. "Why did you run away, Lou? Did the big man frighten' you?" It was Daphne, who answered. "Lou's still at the self- conscious stage with men. She certainly couldn't cope with a hawk like Damon." "I'm pleased to hear it," said Nadine. "Lou wants someone as young and innocent as she is herself. But I don't think we'll have trouble, from Damon or from his manager- friend. If they repair our windmill and clear some of the scrub I shall ask no more." The conversation continued, desultorily, till Lou went indoors to prepare the evening meal. It was much later, nearly bed-time, when Nadine looked up from her book to mention casually: "I forgot to tell you, Lou. The he-man up at Redlands objects to your strolling alone in the woods. It seems it's the breeding season for bucks, or something equally countrified, and the parent bucks can get nasty. They're normally timid, but if you should happen on one in a delicate condition you may get injured by its mate. So he said."

"We've never seen a sign of a buck. They're your trees, aren't they?" "According to him there's no fence between his land and ours — only white posts set up at thirty-yard intervals; he arranged that with my uncle. Have you come across any white posts?" "Yes, but they're not far in." "I'm afraid you're trespassing if you go beyond them. He said he'd seen you while he was out riding, from the other side, so you must have penetrated rather deep." "Why did he have to cook up a story about bucks?" said Lou vexedly. "The fact is, he's anxious to keep us on our own side of the boundary. I rather gathered he was that kind of pig when I spoke to him." Nadine laughed. "Love thy neighbour," she advised, "particularly when he's itching to repair the windmill and inspire us with his own fastidiousness regarding weeds. Have you ever heard of helichrysum?" "Yes, it's that silver-grey bushy stuff. We've tons of it." "Tons too much," Nadine told her solemnly. "It's death to good pasture land, isn't it, Daphne? It has to be scorched off and rooigrass encouraged." Daphne said, "I don't know how you manage to remember so much of what he said. Farming is an awful bore." "Didn't he also say we shouldn't be living in a house like this?" demanded Lou.

"Surprisingly, he didn't, but then he probably realized that we hadn't many beans to rattle together. Don't forget about those bucks and their babies, will you?" On and off Lou had felt rather horrid all evening about the brief exchange she had had with Damon Thorpe that afternoon; she had never felt that way about a new acquaintance before, and the unusualness of it rankled. She did wish Nadine had refused to accept anything from him. Nadine's attitude was strange, by the way. Had she spotted in Damon that rare thing, a kindred spirit - or had it suddenly occurred to her that another man was the best remedy for Daphne's malaise? And what were the man's own reactions to the small houseful of women? That, Lou was sure, would never be known to anyone but Damon Thorpe!

CHAPTER II THE following fortnight provided several small excitements. First came a letter for Nadine from London, commissioning a series of cover-girls, the cheque for which would pay the food bills for at least two months. By the same mail Lou had a few pages from her father, to which was added a postscript by her stepmother. Thinking about Netta she shivered a little. Netta was thirty-eight, about ten years younger than Charles Meredith. She was one of those lively, sharp-witted widows; she dressed extraordinarily well and discussed most things with amazing intelligence. With Charles, who was a lazy and goodhumoured conversationalist and tolerant in his attitude towards everything, she was slightly maternal and wholly accommodating. Her relationship with Lou, however, had bristled with small difficulties. The girl was too domesticated, pronounced Netta, and too engrossed in her work at the library. She ought to get out more and it would do her the world of good to take a flat with a girl friend. Nothing like living away from home^ to give a girl independence. And Lou really ought to do something about those freckles. No; to other women Netta might be an agreeable companion but she could never be really lovable. Lou didn't see how she could ever go back to live in the house at Hampstead. However, there was no need to think about that for a long time. She was doing so many things now that she had never done before. Supervising James was a small education in itself, for the African, besides his willingness and immense strength, had a sense of humour and a thirst for facts. If Lou happened to be dusting one of the rooms while he was slowly and rhythmically polishing the floor,

they held staccato speech with one another; it could not be termed conversation. Also, she had learned to drive the jeep by cruising up and down the road in front of the house. In the Mlemba district there was little traffic to negotiate. The farms were widely spaced and their private lanes joined the main road at long intervals, between which it was uncommon to meet another vehicle. Lou's first real venture in the car was the three-and-a-half mile trip into the town for supplies. She parked under one of the big redwood trees opposite the hotel, walked to the store and had her order packed and stowed in the jeep. The full glare of the sun beat brazenly down upon the dusty road, and Lou stood for a moment looking rather longingly at the hotel veranda, where a few men sat with tankards and tall glasses in front of them. They were ruddyskinned men with open-necked shirts, Rhodesians in town for some reason and combining conviviality with business. Resolutely resisting temptation, she got into the jeep and pressed the starter. The engine gave its usual preliminary groan, and Lou went hot under the sudden concentrated gaze of the drinkers in the hotel veranda. She tried the starter again, with a similar reproachful result. Dash the thing. It would decide to behave eccentrically while she had' an audience - a critical one, at that. She was red to the ears. Simulating calmness, she made a third valiant onslaught. The sound of it had barely died away before the inevitable happened. A masculine face appeared to her right, bent level to her own, and a kindly voice — not one of the younger ones, thank heaven - said : "She's an old bus, isn't she? You'll have to pull out the choke."

Lou gave herself a mental kick for having forgotten, got the engine running and turned to him a politely grateful smile. "Thank you, Mr. .. . Thank you very much." "Marston," he said. "George Marston. I know you by sight already, Miss Meredith. I manage the Redlands estate for Damon Thorpe." For the first time she looked at him squarely, saw a face which was too rugged to be termed good-looking, and darkish hair which was greying at the temples. He must be nearly forty, but he had an ageless, open, smiling look in his hazel eyes. "I'm sorry to have wrenched you from your drink," she said. "I'm glad you did." The eyes crinkled at the corners into a grin. "You three ladies are the talk of the district. When we over there" — he nodded at the hotel - "saw you drive up this morning we began to make plans for laying siege, to Four Winds. Do you realize you're the only unattached women in Mlemba?" "But we are attached - to one another!" "That's all wrong. If the other two are as pretty as you..." "They're much more beautiful." She gave a clear little laugh. "I'll tell them you're interested." "Heaven forbid," he said more soberly. "Not I! It's these young ones. Will you come and be introduced?" "Now?" she exclaimed in alarm. "Why not? I'll guarantee to get the jeep going again, and you'll be perfectly safe with me. I'm your neighbour, you know, and I'm regarded as a universal uncle in these parts."

She went- with him up the red polished steps, allowed him to introduce her to several of the people and took one of the iron chairs at a small table. An orange drink that clinked with ice was set before her, and she drew at the straw luxuriously. She would certainly have something to tell Nadine and Daphne when she got home. George Marston was one of those men one instinctively trusts. Also, his years as an irrigation officer in the lonely reaches of Malawi-had made him a respecter of human beings, so that Lou, though she was only half his age, felt that he liked her as much as and as impersonally as she liked him. Involuntarily she said, "You're not a bit like your house companion, are you? Did he tell you he came to see us?" "Of course. Even to Damon, you're news." "Was he curious about us?" "I've never yet seen Damon curious about women. He got on well with Simon Gardner, though the old chap irritated him. He used to get Simon over to Redlands and talk poetry with him." "Poetry ... Mr. Thorpe?" He laughed briefly. "Damon can discuss anything. By the way, he's not very pleased with the fact of three women living in the little tin hut. What in the world possessed you Londoners to choose Four Winds as a holiday camp?" George Marston was the easiest person in the world to confide in. Lou found herself telling him about Nadine's winter chill and hinting at Daphne's erstwhile unhappiness, and she even gave him a graphic description of the colonial dwelling they had hoped to find. And presently she listened while he expanded upon his own experiences.

He had spent ten years in Malawi and towards the end of that time had met Damon Thorpe. They had arranged matters so that Damon's leave coincided with his own final departure from the humid, subtropical region of Lake Malawi, and together had come south to take a look at Red- lands, which was then for sale. Damon had bought the place and he, George, had agreed to manage it for him till he also was done with Malawi. "That was six years ago," George concluded, "just before Damon was thirty. He was asked to remain on for a further period, so he won't be free for two more years." "Don't you find him difficult to live with? " she asked. "He's the best friend I ever had." He stared into his drink and pushed with a spoon at the floating slice of lemon. "We don't always agree particularly on one subject - but we've never had a row." Damon, thought Lou tartly, was hardly likely to quarrel with the one man whom he could trust to give conscientious attention to the farm in his absence. George Marston was nice, too nice to be worried. For there was a hint of worry in his manner. It had been quite obvious for a moment or two after he'd admitted that there was a subject on which he and Damon did not agree. Oddly, she grew a little angry with the owner of Redlands. She finished her drink regretfully. "That was grand. I'll have to go now or they'll think I've landed in a ditch." He stood up with her. "We haven't a club in Mlemba - not enough of us to make one a paying proposition - but most of us come here for dinner and dancing on Saturday nights. May I pick you up next Saturday? Still the uncle, mind!" "It's very kind of you, but I'll have to consult my housemates." Without thinking she added, "Why don't you call in?"

"I've been hoping you'd say that." He hesitated, looking down at her. "I mean it about Saturday. There's someone I want you to meet." "I'd like to come," she told him frankly. "May I send an answer by James?" "No, I'll take you at your word and drop in - tomorrow morning at about ten. All right?" She nodded brightly, though inwardly dubious. However, he seemed rather determined and vaguely happier than he had been a few minutes ago. Daphne wouldn't mind having a visitor, even so unexciting a one as George Marston, and Nadine could keep out of his way if she preferred. These other men might be warded off, but not one's nearest neighbour. Over a lunch of tinned corn beef with toast fingers, she recounted her meeting with the man. "You'll like him, Nadine," she said eagerly. "He appears to be a confirmed bachelor of the pleasant kind. He likes women but doesn't feel any urge to marry. He won't bother us much, but we may need his help when Damon's gone." "When Damon's gone," replied Nadine impressively, "We'll be preparing to go, too. However, your George sounds harmless, and we'd better look him over if he's taking you out to dinner." "I call it cheek," said Daphne. "Lou hooking the first dinner date. Wait till I get into my stride!" "When you get into your stride," returned Lou, "the men won't remind you that their intentions are strictly brotherly." As it happened, George Marston came earlier next day than he had intended. Something had cropped up at the other end of the Redlands teak plantation, so he had decided to get in his call at Four Winds before setting out. Consequently it was soon after nine when

he reined his horse to the gatepost and came up the narrow curving path into the small veranda, where Nadine was setting up her easel. As usual, she wore a brown holland smock with the sleeves rolled to the elbows, and her hair was smoothed back and coiled into a tight bun. Her long features would have remained expressionless had it not been for the slight elevation of the shapely black wings of her brows. Her voice was cool and amused. "Terrible country, isn't it? There's never anyone around to effect an introduction." "It's not important. After speaking to your golden-red Lou yesterday, I feel I know you very well." To his own astonishment he asked a question which he realized almost at once was far too personal after a few seconds' acquaintance. "Are you going to placate the wraith of Uncle Simon by painting something real?" Nadine, of course, was not nonplussed. This frontal attack from one who was obviously more at home in the saddle than in a drawing room was easy to parry. "I know my limitations far better than Uncle Simon knew his. I paint Daphne; she's real enough for me." "Why not try a portrait of young Lou? " "My dear man," said Nadine equably, as she placed to her own satisfaction the chair in which Daphne would pose, "when I aspire to canvas I'll take a garret in Paris and wear a beret. In this atmosphere, I shall be lucky if I manage to complete my commissions. Do sit down. Men like you and Damon Thorpe are definitely too large to stand around anywhere except under the sky." He laughed, and lowered himself to the wooden veranda rail. "Have you always been the instructor - never the instructed? Since you left school, I mean."

She had taken a penknife from her pocket and was pointing her pencil. The graphite flew out in a little cloud which she blew away before answering: "Independence is a thing of the spirit. One has it, or one hasn't. I have my full quota, that's all. I'm aware that men don't care for independence in women, but I live my life to please myself, not men." "I see. You must be that brand known as the New Woman. I always imagined the type to be frightening, but you're not." She casually pushed a drawing-pin into one corner of the paper which hung on the board. "I've never wanted to frighten a man in my life. I'm not that interested in them," she commented. "You're like the rest - so full of the importance of being a man that you can't believe in the woman who's unimpressed by the magnificence of the sex." "Not at all." He was entirely unruffled. "We men are often very foolish, and few of us can be termed magnificent. We have independence thrust upon us and most of us eventually take to it because there's no other course. I rather admire the woman particularly if she's beautiful - who voluntarily stands alone." "For a bachelor who's lived for ten years in the wilderness and another six here at Mlemba," remarked Nadine, smiling aloofly, "you turn a pretty compliment. I think Lou will be safe with you next Saturday." "Thanks." He considered for a moment. "If I made up a party would you and Miss Pryce come, too?" "Invite Daphne, if you like. I'm not club-minded." "You don't want to make friends here, do you?"

She shrugged, took a duster from the small table and flicked it over the easel. "There's not much point in it, is there? We're here for only a few months." "Supposing," he said, looking at her neat dark head with some deliberation, "your two companions were to find husbands in Mlemba?" "I'd be overjoyed," she said sweetly, "though Lou is the only one of us who could settle in this parched land and be happy about it. Daphne and I are complete townies. I'm afraid I have to get down to work now. Give Lou a shout through the living room, will you?" He took his dismissal pleasantly. "I won't trouble her now. Tell her I'll pick her up at seven-thirty on Saturday." He moved along to the steps and looked back at her. "The new sails for your mill will be ready in a few days. We'll get it fixed for you as soon as they arrive." "Damon works fast, doesn't he?" she said evenly. "I'll thank him when I see him." For her dinner engagement on Saturday, Lou decided to wear a green silk trouser suit. She guessed, correctly, that only on special occasions was full evening wear necessary. George appeared pleased with her appearance, and on the way from Four Winds into the town he told her about some of the families who lived scattered over the two hundred square miles which constituted the Mlemba district. He parked his sedan on the end of a line of assorted vehicles, and they crossed the road to the hotel, which looked bigger and more imposing by night. The veranda and lounge were crowded and noisy, and everyone seemed to know everyone else.

George took her through the vestibule into a room which opened to a balcony. Here, there were two or three vacant tables, and George chose the one out on the balcony, which looked over a small dry garden with a date palm in the centre. He ordered whisky for himself and a grenadilla with a dash of gin for Lou. Had she not been absorbed in new sensations she might have noticed that he was just a little restless and on edge. He looked at his watch more than once, but his talk, still about local conditions and the utter happiness which could be achieved however simply one lived, flowed easily and continuously. He was the pleasantest of companions. People were leaving the lounge for the dining room. George again shot back his cuff, then finished his drink. "I've reserved a table," he said, "but perhaps we'd better go in and take it. Ready?" Lou nodded and was about to stand when he added, in some relief, "I told you the other day I'd like you to meet someone I know. Here he comes, through the garden. Val will never push his way through a crowd if he can help it." With curiosity and detachment Lou watched a slim young man heave himself over the balcony rail. He did not do it with the careless assurance one would expect from a man of his age - he couldn't be more than twenty-five or six - nor did he wear the smile which usually goes with that kind of behaviour. He stared at Lou, cast his glance quickly at George and back to Lou. George was saying smoothly, "You're a bit late, Val; we were just going in to dinner. Lou, this is my brother. He's learning how to farm before he takes a place of his own. Lou Meredith, Val."

The young man slicked back his fairish hair with an almost nervous gesture. His eyes, a very light grey-blue, again flickered over them both and he smiled, with the same touch of nervousness. "When George dines with a woman it's something," he said. "Sure I won't be in the way?" "My dear boy," replied George, "this occasion was manufactured expressly for you. Would you like a drink?" He shook his head but sat down. He got out cigarettes and offered them. Lou noticed nicotine stains on slim, sensitive fingers which looked as if they belonged to an artist rather than to a farmer. She felt him looking at her again, and she smiled, showing her even little teeth and the hint of a dimple at the corner of her mouth. He smiled, too, and for a strange minute it seemed as if they were alone, understanding each other: the young man whose light eyes were inexplicably shadowed, and the smiling, candid girl. George said, "Shall we go to dinner?" As they went through to the vestibule Val slipped a hand into the crook of her arm. Walking behind them, George saw it and his own hand doubled at his side. Was this little thing with the rough, reddish hair and appealing grey eyes the answer? Instinctively, the other day, he had thought she was. He knew Val better than Val knew himself; the loneliness, because he was more of an intellectual than most of the men here, and that ingrown anguish which only a loving and compassionate woman could obliterate. They were crossing the vestibule to the dining room when Damon came in from the veranda. Lou felt the fingers close tighter about her arm as they stopped, she the least concerned of the three of them.

Damon, tall, dark, and eagle-faced, wore an immaculate white dinner jacket. He took the pace or two which divided them, bowed slightly in Lou's direction and said, "Good evening, Miss Meredith. How's it going, Val? Still planting tobacco?" In flat tones, Val answered, "I'm getting along." His manner added, "Without your help!" Steadily, George put-in, "He'll be starting a place of his own in a few months. In fact, I'm hoping to pin him down soon, so that I can get some of the clearing done while you're still here." Damon shrugged. "If you're determined to be unwise, I'll do what I can for you. We'll discuss it." "That isn't necessary." It was Val who spoke, apparently to the mild surprise of both his brother and Damon. "I intend to go in for farming in this district, and George's experience is good enough for me. I wouldn't accept a loan if you offered it, Damon. I'd sooner take out a mortgage." There was no heat in his voice and Damon appeared scarcely to heed the remarks, yet Lou felt the antipathy between them as if it were tangible. Damon, accustomed to working among Africans, behaved with everyone as if the world were his footstool. His judicial coldness antagonized even Lou, so it must cause a genuine fury in Val. As for George ... well, he knew Damon rather better than anyone else knew him. George said now, "We won't do anything in a hurry. There are several aspects to consider." "Quite," from Damon.

Lou became aware that the deliberate greenish-blue gaze was taking her in from head to toe, as if she were one of the aspects. She met his eyes fearlessly but found them quite unreadable. "By the way, Miss Meredith," he said, as though it were an afterthought, "I'd like you three ladies of Four Winds to come to Redlands for dinner tomorrow. I'll send the car for you." "I'm not sure we can come." "Made other arrangements?" he asked coolly. "I don't think so, but..." "Seven o'clock, then. Perhaps Val will make a sixth. He doesn't usually care for Redlands, but I daresay your persuasions will outdo the strength of his will." He pushed a hand into his pocket and half turned away. "The bunch here doesn't change much, does it? Thank heaven I'm dining over at the Stricklands'. See you later, George. Good night, Miss Meredith and Val." For a while, even when they were consuming chicken soup and a casserole of venison and pork, the shadow of Damon hung over them. His cold and strong personality lingered, stunting their conversation till George made a determined effort to be gay. They had coffee with Chartreuse, and later Lou danced with them both in the small ballroom at the back of the hotel to magnified gramophone music; once with George and twice with Val. Val seemed to be losing some of the nervy tenseness. He gave Lou details of the farm on the edge of the Mlemba district where he worked as an assistant. He lived in a comfortable log cabin and spent half his salary on books which he ordered from England; which was odd, she reflected, when he was hoping to buy a farm. He had been in Rhodesia eighteen months and for the most part he

liked it. Not the summers; they were too hot, and he would have preferred to live nearer the coast. He talked quite charmingly and with an air of honesty which, however, did not altogether succeed. Just what it was about him that puzzled her Lou could not have explained. She got the impression that maybe he had had a serious illness or some other setback, and that George was doing all in his power to get him over it. It was Val who took her home, in his worn two-seater. He stood with her at the gate and held one of her hands in both of his. "You're very sweet, Lou," he said. "Like a draught of spring water. Now that you're here I shall live for the weekends. I wish Thorpe were away, so that I could stay with George; then I'd see you most of the time." "Will you be at Redlands tomorrow night?" He frowned. "I haven't decided." He looked away and said hurriedly, "There's so much I must tell you - but I can't spoil our first meeting with it. I think I'd better have a private word with George tomorrow morning. If I don't see you again this weekend, promise you'll keep next weekend open for me. I'll be here, at Four Winds, by lunch time next Saturday. Soon after that he hastily put her hand to his cheek, and left her. That last brief gesture Lou found touching. She watched him reverse the car and bump away over the loose stones, and then turned to go into the house.

CHAPTER III DAMON'S tourer arrived at Four Winds dead on time. It was driven by an African boy in a white safari suit who went round to the back of the house to inform James he was ready to carry the three white "missus" back to Redlands. They were all dressed and waiting. Nadine, statuesque in black and white, the dark hair parted in the centre and drawn back in two shallow waves to coil in her neck. Daphne wearing a smart ice-blue linen suit and dainty mesh pumps, and Lou in slim-fitting white. Nadine's attitude to the invitation had been tolerant. "Sunday supper with the Squire," she commented. "I ought to have remembered to bring a straw hat with cherries round the brim. I haven't even a pair of black cotton gloves." Daphne's reaction had been more enthusiastic. "You can weigh up a man in his own surroundings. Perhaps we shall find out if Damon really is the cold fish he appears. Do you know what I wish?" "That Damon would turn out to be the man to crush all other men in your love life," suggested Nadine dryly. "Not exactly. I'm not anxious to repeat past blunders. But I would like to discover whether it's possible to rouse him. I believe I'll try." Incomprehensibly, Lou had inserted rather sharply, "It's not so long since you were heartbroken and wanted nothing more to do with men." "The heart can't bleed for ever, darling," returned Daphne flippantly. "I could still feel horribly grim about that affair if I let myself, but what's the good P He's on his honeymoon in South America, and I wish him joy of it. I'll have a honeymoon myself one of these days,

but meanwhile I'll have fun. Damon behaves as if he'd never in his life felt any urge to kiss a woman. I'd love to tilt his equilibrium." "Take it steadily and you'll do it," murmured Nadine, to whom all human nature had its frail spot. "I'd say that his woman must be modest and sophisticated, and no one knows better than you, my pet, how to combine those qualities." It was only light-hearted chatter, but Lou hadn't liked it. Her own pleasant anticipation of an evening at Redlands had dwindled, so that it was even an effort to dress for it. But as they sat in the car, she beside the boy and the other two in the back, her spirit revived. A pity it was so dark, but the vision grew accustomed to it, and presently she could pick out the big eucalyptus trees which bordered the Red- lands timber. The house was a low white structure, the rooms sprawling round a centre forecourt, the thatched roof almost hidden by thick bougainvillea, flowering, at this season, in masses of cerise and purple. The front door, a studded oaken affair, opened straight into a wide lounge, and the dining room lay beyond it, up two wide steps and through an archway. Lou saw this much before she saw Damon. He came swiftly through the long dining room into the lounge. "Sorry I wasn't out in front to greet you," he said. "The kitchen boy has just gashed his arm and I had to give first aid." His smile was aloof but perfectly friendly. "Jacob will take your wraps. Sit down wherever you fancy. A drink?" "Thank you, Damon," said Nadine, with lifted, sardonic brows. She looked about her at the deep chairs, the carved tables and at the fireplace at the far end of the room which was flanked oil each side by crammed bookshelves. "Martini for me."

George came in, smiling, and fresh in a suit a shade darker than Damon's light tropical one. He greeted them individually, gave Lou a special smile and poured himself a whisky and soda. "I'm afraid we're five," Damon said. "We invited a sixth but he couldn't make it. However, as we're neighbours, it hardly matters." "We shan't be able to return your hospitality unless you're willing to eat on the veranda," Nadine remarked calmly. She patted the wide, overstuffed arm of her chair. "It seems ten years since I last sat in such luxury. Uncle Simon must have been something of a Spartan." "I don't think we'd better talk about your house," said Damon crisply. "Does it make you wince to think of three lovelies inhabiting such a shack?" she asked sympathetically. "We don't mind. It's like camping - better, because we're protected from straying cattle and crawlies. Think how we're going to enjoy our service flats when we get back to them!" "I must say you take it well," George commented. Nadine's expression sharpened ever so little. "Women do, you know. It's men who are the creatures of comfort. Lou has the least comfort of any of us, and look how she blooms." Lou bloomed at that moment, scarlet. George smiled across at her reassuringly, and Damon gave her a cool, slanting glance. Daphne diverted their attention, her blue eyes sparkling. "Don't pity us — we have fun. Nadine works, I pose, and Lou's the maid. I help with the cooking occasionally, but on the whole I'm one of the sensuous type - in the best sense, of course! You wouldn't believe it possible for three women to get along together so well as we do."

"I suspect," remarked Damon, "that one is completely self-assured, one so beautiful that she invariably gets her own way, and the third too young to be permitted a personality. The relationship may last the six months you've set yourselves, but it wouldn't stretch longer." "Oh, but why not?" demanded Daphne. "Because you're a definite triangle - your personalities don't merge; your only common ground is in being women, which you'll agree" with a hint of satire - "is not usually considered much of a bond. And whether you like it or not, there'll be outside influences." He opened a crystal box of cigarettes and leant over to offer one to Nadine. "Would it matter so much," he enquired negligently, "if you didn't go back to England?" "Not go back?" Nadine sounded slightly staggered. "I wouldn't have come here if I'd thought there was the smallest risk of that. I couldn't settle here. It's all right for a break, but to do decent work I need the traffic and the people of London. I'd stifle here!" "Noise drugs the spirit," George observed musingly. "I suppose that's sometimes convenient." Nadine set her cigarette to Damon's lighter and drew at it rather hard. The slender, expressive brows came together, but she answered agreeably, "You're like a nice horse, George — utterly trustworthy but occasionally disconcerting. I once learned a lot about horses at a country house-party." "And you concluded," he said with a slow, pointed grin, "that you were happier when they stayed in their stables. Very sensible." The talk turned to horse-riding. Damon offered mounts, and George undertook to teach Lou, if she liked. Nadine refused to imagine herself on horseback, and Daphne, who, in the course of her training

as a model, had attended a riding school for a season, agreed to go out with Damon one morning next week. Before the subject was quite disposed of a servant came in to inform his master that dinner was ready to be served. During the meal Lou felt a trifle more at ease. Damon sat at the head of the table and the others were arranged two on each side; there was no one at the foot. Lou had Nadine on her right and George just opposite which, to her relief, obviated the exchange of many pleasantries with their host. There was something about him which set her teeth on edge; an utter lack of emotion backed up by a bladesharp- ness in his character that reminded her continually of her own youth and innocence. Yet she had to admit that he was a charming companion; unfailingly courteous and attentive to his guests, and an interesting conversationalist. There was a moment when she was even beguiled into asking him a question. "What is it like in Malawi?" His smile at her held mockery. "It's hot and sticky, malarial in parts and lonely for white people. You'd loathe it." "You seem to like it, and George didn't mind it, either." "We're only men. We don't measure enjoyment in new frocks and jaunts to the cinema." Lou's sinews tightened. He meant to hurt, but she intended that he shouldn't see how far he had succeeded. "I suppose in the tropics," she remarked, "you measure it by whisky bottles and games of poker. It's merely a matter of comparison." His mouth twitched. "How right you are. I didn't guess you had it in you, Louise."

They carried their nightcaps out into the veranda which looked out over the crazy-paved courtyard. Cicadas were shrilling in the great columns of bougainvillea and tall, grotesque palms rustled their fronds against the wine-dark sky. "What's the smell," Lou queried, "orange blossom? " Damon nodded. "A few precociously early flowers. We haven't picked all of last season's oranges yet. Like to see them?" "Isn't it too dark?" "Not for eyes as young as yours." More quickly than she had expected, he took her drink from her hand and placed it on the circular table around which they were grouped. "Come on," he said with a trace of impatience. He led the way to the fruit garden, offhandedly indicating a row of dwarf orange trees whose large golden globes were quite clearly to be seen in the pale radiance of the stars. "I didn't bring you here to dilate upon fruit-growing," he said abruptly. "I hoped to get a word alone with you tonight, but it didn't work out. Will you meet me tomorrow?" Her heart began unaccountably to thump. "We're alone now," she pointed out. "What I have to tell you can't be said in a hurry. Tomorrow?" he insisted. "You're very mysterious. There can't possibly be any reason why..." "For Pete's- sake! This is entirely for your good — not mine." His eyes were actually glittering and she could see his teeth closed tight

with distaste and irritability. "If I could see you alone at Four Winds I'd come. As I can't you must meet me somewhere. Go to the boundary in the trees; find one of the white posts and stay near it. I'll ride through till I meet you. Can you manage it straight after breakfast?" "I'm busy then, but the others rest after lunch." "Very well, after lunch. Say two-thirty. And stay well in the open on the boundary path. It's safe there." With an odd, savage movement he tugged at a spray of orange-flower buds and thrust it into her hand. "Here, take this and display it." As they went back to the veranda he said nothing at all. Daphne, as fresh now as when she had arrived four hours ago, made a teasing remark, and Damon, after he had seen Lou seated, went round to take the chair he had vacated, between the other two women. There was more jesting, a little more music, then George got out his own car to drive the occupants of Four Winds to their abode.

It was not till next morning that Lou could think with clarity about Damon's request of the previous evening. The queerness of it was even more stark by daylight. Except for the sprig of orange blossom which stood in a beaker on the window-sill of her little room, she would have attributed the brief scene in the garden to her imagination. She came back to the wax-white flowers several times during the morning. They were opening and smelled heavily- sweet; it was a scent her thoughts would for ever connect with the master of Redlands. Fortunately, though, one seldom contacted natural orange blossom in England. She wouldn't be reminded of him there.

Nadine worked desultorily, and the conversation when the three got together over mid-morning coffee naturally focused upon their two neighbours. "I think we're lucky," she stated. "We might have had someone middle-aged with a fussy, inquisitive wife. Damon's stimulating." "George has his moments, too," submitted Daphne mischievously. "He has it in for you, darling." "I know." Nadine snapped her long fingers. "I can handle him; he's slow." "He's not slow at all - he merely gives an impression of slowness. In one breath he says he admires career women and in the next he gives a half-wink. The plodding kind can be dangerous." Nadine's slim shoulders lifted. "George Marston could never be dangerous to anyone, but Damon is a different proposition; neither so cold nor so remote as he would have us believe. He's capable of swift decisions, so you'd better watch your step, or you may find yourself a benighted bride in Central Africa." "There's just the chance," said Daphne lightly, "that I could win him away from Africa. If it came to the point I'd have a darned good try." "You wouldn't succeed," put in Lou, more doggedly than was necessary. "He works in Malawi and is putting out roots in Rhodesia. I don't think he'll ever marry, but if he does, the woman will have to grow in with him, not he with her." Daphne remarked maddeningly, "You're only an infant, Lou, and when you fall in love it will be something tender and sweet and whole-hog. I've grown beyond that. When I marry it'll be half for

love and the other half for a good time. The dominant sex owes me that!" "Would you consider it fair to marry with that kind of idea in your mind?" Nadine said soothingly, "The man who marries Daphne will get his money's worth, my pet. So will the man who marries you - but in a different way. How thankful I am that your problems won't be mine!" She drained her coffee cup. "I hope they won't invite us up there too often. I haven't felt so slack since I had 'flu, back in England." Lou took away the coffee tray and washed up. She felt quite flat herself. Indeed, Daphne was the only one who looked really alive today. It was as if the last-shred of humiliation over her cruellyended love affair had drifted off, leaving her as gay and beautyconscious as she had been a year ago. Lou was beginning to feel her position in the house rather keenly. Between them, Nadine and Daphne were earning money. Lou had brought a few pounds and she had left the rest of her small savings with her father so that she would not be penniless when she came home. Vaguely, she had thought of earning her keep by working in the house and on .the farm, but Four Winds had turned out to be so small, the land so barren that she could only stand and stare at it, and wish. Had Mlemba been a bigger town she might have got a job there. She had not entirely climbed out of her depression when she cleared the lunch table and changed into a striped frock and white sandals. But when she had been walking for a while, first of all in the shade of the thorn-bush hedge and then among the thorn trees which bordered Four Winds, she felt better.

She had been resting against a post for perhaps five minutes when Damon cantered into sight. Here, he was about three miles from his house, whereas she, had the trees not been in the way, could have glimpsed Four Winds in the distance. He reined in and swung to the ground, looped the reins over the saddle and, as he gave the horse a push, mentioned that she was late; this was his second ride along the path. He looked down at Lou as she stood before him, her feet in the flat sandals planted squarely as if she were nerving herself for a session with the headmistress, the striped dress with the clipped-in waist, the grey eyes a shade smoky in the light which filtered through the branches. Cynicism pulled at the corner of his mouth. "I'll bet you hate those freckles," he said. Lou became conscious of her own tension and willed herself to relax. She contrived a non-committal smile. "Why should I?" "Because with them you're only pretty, whereas without them you could aspire to a genuine, if simple, beauty. I expect one of these days you'll go into a beauty parlour for a few hours and emerge flawless." He added unexpectedly, "Don't ever bleach your hair, though, will you?" Lou let out an imprisoned breath. Her voice had gone husky. "Suppose you tell me why I had to meet you here today," she said. He allowed several seconds to elapse before answering pleasantly, "You probably have a good notion already. I can't imagine Val Marston fighting very long against the need to pour his anxieties into your small, receptive ear. But he won't have told you the plain truth." "He hasn't told me anything," she said quickly.

"No? Then he's even more serious about you than I thought." His infuriating coolness made her touchy. "What are you getting at?" she demanded crossly. "I've only met Val once, and it's enough for me that he's George's brother. What he and I have to say to each other can hardly be your business." "That's so," he conceded. "You should be grateful to me for taking an interest. I'm doing it because you strike me as being easily put upon." "I assure you I'm not!" He shrugged disbelief. "Let me tell you something. George and I have been friends for nearly eight years. He runs the farm just as I like it, and I hope that eventually, when we add to the acreage of Redlands, we'll manage the place together. He and his kind are the salt of the British colonies. But George — like all nice men — has his blind spot; in his case it's his brother." He paused, then queried quietly, "What did you think of Val Marston?" Lou was remembering a statement of George's - that there was one subject upon which he and Damon could not agree; and, inexplicably, she ranged herself on George's side. "I like Val," she said firmly. "Because he's a lame dog?" "Is he? I wouldn't have thought it. He has nothing in common with you, of course, but that doesn't make him any the less likeable." Damon's eyes narrowed. "I know you're going to hold this against me, but I'm afraid I don't care. Get one thing fixed in your mind; in talking to you like this I've nothing to gain and nothing to lose. It's

merely that I consider it my duty, because I'm the only one outside those two who knows the facts." "Are you quite sure," she said, "that they wish me to know the facts? Wouldn't it be best to leave the telling to them?" "Don't get tough with me," he replied coolly. "I set myself this anything but pleasant task and I mean to carry it through. You must have realized already that Val is essentially a limp character, but you're not experienced enough to see through George. You regard him as a good, accommodating sort of chap who wants nothing so much as to be a kind uncle to you. Actually, the relationship he's after is rather closer; he'd prefer to be your brother-in-law." As she made to speak he held up a peremptory hand. "Don't exclaim your incredulity. I've lived with George for nearly three months, and it didn't take me anything like that long to learn that his big ambition is to find a dear, loyal little wife for Val." She would be silenced no longer. "You're being ridiculous," she said. "Val's twenty-six. He'll find his own wife when he's ready to marry! I really don't understand what you're getting at." "Try listening for a bit, and you will. Let's walk." He took a grip on her arm and turned her so that they were moving slowly, side by side, up the track. "Soon — maybe the next time you meet - Val will give you his life story and make much of the accident which drove him to Rhodesia. Baldly, what happened is this: he crashed a car in one of England's country lanes and his passenger was killed. The passenger was his mother.'' "Oh." It was a sound of pity, and involuntarily she stopped and stared up at him. But the hand on her arm pushed her inexorably on. "So that's why he's strung up all the time," she ended softly.

"It happened," replied Damon flatly, "just on two years ago. Following the shock and remorse he had a nervous breakdown and was unable to follow his profession - he was training in research chemistry. George got him to come out here — which wouldn't have been a bad move, except that he was so shaken by the difference in his brother that he went all sentimental and paternal." "But that's understandable. It must have been a ghastly experience for Val!" "Agreed," said Damon tersely. "It's something that no man would be entirely able to live down, inside himself. On the other hand, he can best make up the loss to his brother and the world at large by becoming a passably worthy creature himself. I never knew Val before I came down to Red- lands this time, but from what I've seen of him I doubt if he's ever been anything but a spoiled boy. He's fourteen years younger than George, was cosseted as a child and doted on as he grew older. He's soft right through to the core." "Is that such a bad thing?" His hand dropped and every vestige of' intimacy went from his tone. "You're all for the weak; I knew you would be. You've a sturdy little backbone of your own and you're willing to share it. George guessed that the first time he ran into you, down in Mlemba. He said nothing of the kind to me, of course, but I got the hang of it when I saw you in the hotel with the two of them on Saturday. I'm not blaming George. He's one of the best, and as far as he could he'd help you to make a success of marriage with Val." "For heaven's sake stop talking of marriage," she said with vexation. "I hardly know Val."

His mouth mocked. "He'll put that right, my child. In a month you'll know him so well that his troubles will be all yours. I'm warning you to stiffen yourself against him. He'll have you if you don't!" Lou felt a little sick and unhappy, and wasn't quite sure why. She pitied Val, but it was not pity which caused the sensation of coldness and deflation; there was some connection with Damon. She drew a long sigh. "You're ruthless," she said. "How would you treat Val if you were George?" "In the first place," he answered evenly, "I'd have put it to him quite forcibly that as a citizen of the world he had responsibilities. Then I'd have shoved him into a horticultural research station — it's the nearest thing we have in this country to what he was doing in England. I'd have made him realize that it was his job, even more than anyone else's, to save lives by combating the pests that destroy foods and cause famines. I'd keep him at it - and I would not let up till I was convinced he'd regained his self-respect." "But he's sensitive. He needed sympathy." "He got it," Damon said bluntly, "and what good did he get out of it? He's a rotten driver, because he torments himself with remembering that other grisly drive. He's a poor farmer because his heart isn't in farming, and he does what no man should ever do - he clings. To George, to bitter memories - and he'll cling to you, because you're about the first unmarried girl he's come across in Rhodesia." They had turned into a footpath and come to the end of the trees. The chestnut was over there, grazing on Four Winds land, and the house looked tiny against the distant mountain; a cottage-shaped ornament, thought Lou, dropped on to a crumple of brown and green

homespun. The simile was English, but there was nothing English about the sky and the sun. They burned. Damon lightly touched her head. "You're not sufficiently accustomed to this sun to come out without a hat. Think you could sit my horse?" "He's too big. I'll go the way I came, in the shade of the hedge." "I'll take you," he said. He whistled to the horse and it came at the quick, awkward walk of a beast which habitually moves with speed. Damon sprang into the saddle with a lightness amazing in one so tall, and leaned down towards Lou. "Put up your arms," he said. He caught her under them with a hold that bruised, and lifted her. In a second she was sitting side-saddle in front of him. She heard the smile in his voice and wished she could see it; he smiled so seldom. "It's far less comfortable than it looks on the films, but we'll make it. Brig will hardly notice your extra weight." His heel prodded the horse into a lope. Lou felt terribly insecure, and then she forgot the insecurity of her posture because Damon's hand was hard and warm through the thin dress at her waist and he was like a wall at her back. Had she been capable of thinking clearly she would have admitted that on the whole she had never felt more entrenched ... nor more unwilling for the moments to pass. It was exciting, and totally unreal. He pulled up about a hundred yards from the house, and got down with her.

"Overrated, isn't it?" he said. "The romance is blunted by the edge of the saddle. Well, don't forget all I've told you. You're in time, now, to keep your distance from Val. If you get embroiled, it'll be your own fault." "I suppose I ought to thank you." "Not if you don't feel that way," he said carelessly. "Run along in." "You won't come in for a cup of tea?" "No, thanks. That place makes me feel like a Great Dane in a terrier's kennel." He was up on Brig's back when he added casually, "You might remind the fair Daphne that she and I are riding together on Wednesday morning. I've picked out a sedate gelding for her." With an economical lift of the hand he turned the horse and galloped off over the grass towards the trees. Lou's fingers had curled into her palms and one fist unconsciously pressed against the warmth in her side, where his hand had lain. She watched him grow small and disappear into the timber, and then went indoors to make tea.

CHAPTER IV TOWARDS the end of that week the repairs to the water- mill were completed, and with every breeze water was pumped into the huge round cement reservoir which was connected to the house by pipeline. They could now have a bath as often as they pleased, and also try planting a few vegetables which eventually might help Lou to save on the household bills. For a farming country, meat and vegetables were outrageously expensive. To Lou, that week was interminable. No one called, Nadine was working at top pitch, and Daphne alternated exasperatingly between high spirits and drowsing for hours with a novel. Lou was glad when Saturday dawned and she could take the jeep into Mlemba and do some marketing. It was a funny little market. The stalls were old boards on trestles, and the produce the surplus from the crops of the local farmers; the usual English vegetables, plus pumpkins, squashes, avocado pears, a few papaws from those farms which were well irrigated, and an occasional box of guavas. There were a fair supply of eggs, a pound or two of farm butter and an occasional piece of home-cured bacon, but no one ever offered the smallest slice of cheese. With fresh vegetables in the house and an odd treat in the way of new rolls or white cheese which Lou had made from an accumulation of sour milk, Saturday lunch was the most interesting meal of the week. On that particular Saturday she braised a small piece of steak and poached some guavas in syrup; the coffee was extra good, too, and inevitably they sat longer at the table. Consequently, when Val drove up in his two-seater at something after two, Lou had hardly finished washing up. Hurriedly, she introduced him to Nadine and Daphne in the living room, and went off to wash and change.

She had almost forgotten Val's promise to come today, but she wasn't sorry he had kept it. He looked attractive, with his light tan and well-brushed fair hair, and he had smiled as if he hadn't a care in the world. Damon's grim warning seemed somewhat overdone. Val planned to take her to see the polo at Mlemba Park, after which they would spend the evening at the hotel. Nadine looked at Lou and her lower lid twitched in the ghost of a wink. "You're getting around, Lou, but I approve your escort. He's certainly more your cup of tea than our George. Have fun, ducky. These are the best years of your life. So long, Val." As he drove down into Mlemba, Val had an air of quiet happiness. The tension was gone, arid he commented with amusement upon Nadine and Daphne. "What an assorted trio you are," he said. "Nadine is fine, but I find Daphne frightening." "Frightening?" she echoed. "Men adore her. She's entirely a man's woman." "A certain type might take to her. She strikes me as mercenary, as if she'd put into any relationship — whether friendship or something more intimate — just a little less than she got out of it. She's hard as nails." "That's not quite fair. Daphne had bad luck in England and she's not altogether over it, that's all. Everyone takes to her — your brother included." "George gets on well with everyone - even with Damon Thorpe. Daphne Pryce and Damon are about level in most respects." He grimaced. "How I hate the clever man or woman!"

"Nadine's clever," she pointed out, "and she's the dearest person on earth." "Hers isn't a calculated cleverness. It has a lot to do with her being older and more experienced than we are. I should imagine she's forbearing, a good friend." "All that and more. She and I are second cousins and I've looked up ..to her ever since I was a child. She's never let me down." She glanced at him curiously. "You total people up pretty thoroughly, don't you?" "It's a habit that's grown on me since I've been in Rhodesia. The result of introspection, I suppose. Whenever I meet someone new I wonder how they're going to affect me. I'm horribly susceptible to the influences of other people." "Aren't we all!" she agreed a trifle ruefully, recollecting Damon's cold logic on the subject. Val nodded his smiling comprehension, his eyes on the road ahead. He drove carefully, and Lou recalled the statement that Val was a rotten driver. He seemed to be doing well enough now. Damon, in his dislike of George's brother, had really gone a bit too far. It was a wonderfully pleasant afternoon. They sat under thicklyleaved acacias and watched a moderately exciting game of polo, went into the pavilion for tea and came out to see more polo as the sun went down. Dusk was falling as they left the ground, and when they reached the hotel the stars were struggling through, isolated gems against purple velvet. Neither was well known at the hotel, so they were able to drink, dine and dance without being coaxed to join a group. Val wanted to

know about her childhood, where she lived and what she had done during the last few years. Lou answered simply but asked no questions in return. There was a moment, when they were dancing, in which his arm had tightened about her and she had been certain in her mind that for some reason anguish had revived in him. She went on dancing, effortlessly, and soon the arm slackened. "I believe," he said then, "that you and I are going to understand each other without words. I'm so terribly glad you've come into my life, Lou — so glad that I'm shaky with it." They were in the car outside Four Winds when he told her about his mother's death. He had driven her up, and in the second or two after the engine had stopped had placed his hand over hers, detaining her without words. She had known what was coming and sat very still, and presently, with, a self-deprecating little apology it had all come out, very quietly and with scarcely a tremor. Lou listened and felt some of the horror which had gripped him. Involuntarily, the hand which had been under his on the seat between them twisted and clasped his fingers. He was very white when he had finished, white and spent. He could not look her way. "It's past," she said softly, "and it does no good to anyone to go on punishing yourself. It's wrong to keep on suffering for something which was unavoidable. You must see that, Val." "I do see it, mostly. But life has been so empty without her. Even George doesn't realize how close we were, particularly after my father died." He paused. "You know, you have an odd effect on me, Lou. If I'd told you all this last week I'd have made an ass of myself. After a week of having you to look forward to I can see it more

objectively. George always says it's saner to dwell on the living than on the dead, and that's what I've been doing since we met. I couldn't get you out of my mind ... didn't want to." Gently she withdrew her hand. "You've wallowed too much," she said with a compassionate smile. "Don't look back any more; there are such heaps of lovely things in the present. Do you mind if I go now? " "I've kept you late, haven't I? May I come along tomorrow?" "If you like, but there won't be much to do." "I'm pretty good at doing nothing. I'll come to breakfast." "Don't do that," she said in alarm. "Nadine and Daphne have theirs in bed on Sundays." "All the better. We'll be tête-à-tête yet perfectly proper with two heavy chaperons in the background." She said a quick-good night, got out of the car before he could help her and flitted up the path. Val had been far more companionable than she had anticipated, reflected Lou as she slipped into bed and turned down the lamp. Damon's prejudice arose, she rather thought, from Val's youth and vulnerability. He expected superhuman control from everyone; probably had no time for the more sensitive character. What was more natural than that Val should find it necessary to confide in a woman? His confession had been restrained enough to satisfy the coolest listener, and she didn't think he would refer to the subject again. Val turned up at a quarter to nine next morning. He ate eggs and bacon, dried the dishes which Lou had washed, and persuaded her to

take a walk over the bush-covered mountain slope. Considering they had been together for so many hours the day before, it was amazing how much they found to talk about. The Marstons came from the Midlands, and Val, hypersensitive about factory chimneys and the grime which goes with industry, had found relief and escape in music. He had enjoyed his own job, but even that had demanded too much precision, too frequent contact with the humdrum to be really congenial. Concerts had been his outlet, and he didn't play the piano too badly himself. "Is there a piano at the farm where you live?" she asked. "Yes, an old-fashioned instrument of torture; I never play it." He flexed his fingers, watching the knuckles turn white. "Damon Thorpe has a music room, with a grand piano. Did you know that?" "Lord, no. The man's full of surprises. Surely he doesn't play?" Val gave a short laugh. "Not he. But he says that new countries always lack culture, and the music room is there to encourage local talent. Every few weeks he gives a highbrow party which develops into a musical evening." "Have you played there? " "Yes, once. His Eminence described my performance as painfully over-emotionalized." Val shrugged. "He and I are poles apart. We'll never see any good in each other." "That's how it is with some of us," Lou agreed sympathetically. "You ought to get hold of a piano for your little log cabin." "A decent one would be expensive. George offered to give me one when I first came out, but I think he was relieved when I refused it. George is of the earth, and a man at a piano strikes him as

effeminate - a man who isn't a genius or a jazz-fiend, that is. Even George has a respect for genius." "I like your brother," she said. "He's a grand potential husband gone to waste." Val walked on for a minute or two in silence, flicking at the rooibosch on his side of the path with a stick he had picked up. Then he enquired on a tentative note, "What does a woman look for in a husband - just security?" "I don't think she looks for anything," she answered honestly, "not till after she's in love, anyway. Love comes first. Later she may discover it was the man's obvious integrity which attracted her, but it might just as easily have been his charming smile or his air of seriousness. It depends so much on one's own personality — the sort of people one's attracted to, I mean." "Yes, it does. You're such a wise little person, Lou." He smiled into her eyes. "You're so direct that I believe you'll always get what you want. You must find life very uncomplicated." "Not exactly," she said, with a trace of irony which had nothing to do with Val. "Other people tend to complicate one's existence, as we've said before." On the way back Val slid his arm round Lou's. The sun was high and hot, but a strong wind whipped the dry soil into whirlpools of dust and carried leaves and twigs across the sere grass. "This is a dangerous time of the year," he said idly. "A dropped cigarette can do no end of damage. Might do your land a bit of good, though. That helichrysum should be scorched off." "Your brother is going to do it for us. I suppose Damon wants the land to be shipshape when he takes over."

"Is Damon buying it?" he demanded quickly. "Is that official?" "No, but we adjoin Redlands and he's after more land. He offered to buy from Nadine's uncle, two or three years ago." After a moment Val said, his lips thin, "I hope Nadine will force up the price. Better still, I hope she'll sell to someone else." He pushed back his shoulders as if throwing off ill-feeling, and smiled at her. "Not that I really care. You're good for me, Lou - you stop me from brooding." When they got back to the house he had a cup of coffee and some biscuits, chatted with the three women for a while and then said good-bye. He had to be back at the farm to do some evening duties, and he wanted to see George before leaving. If they didn't mind he would call in again next weekend. "Well," said Nadine, when Lou had come back to the living room from seeing him off, "he's yours if you want him, my dear. If that look in his eyes wasn't the need of a man for one particular woman, I've never seen it before!" Lou was putting the coffee cups back on the tray and scooping ash from the table top. "He's just lonely," she commented. "I don't want him to come here every weekend. We can't possibly find different things to talk about so often, and besides, his kind of caller is expensive. He had two of our dozen eggs and a large-sized rasher this morning." "That's sobering," observed Nadine, "particularly as I've a strange feeling that our financial resources are going to dry up." Daphne, who had been perusing a periodical and paying no attention to the conversation, now planked the magazine on the table and leaned upon it, staring at Nadine. "Are you serious?"

"As serious as not receiving letters from England can make me. I got that one commission because it was half arranged before I left. I was promised others, but looking at it squarely, I can't for the life of me see why they should send to Rhodesia for drawings which, with less trouble, can be done in England. Then there's the chance that my stuff might not be quite right. I've had to do alterations now and then — but who's going to send them back here to be touched up?" Nadine's well-shaped shoulders lifted. "I'm not worried about losing my market; I've too many good friends over there who will be only too glad to give me a break when I get back. But we are going to be a little short of cash." A brief silence. Then Lou said, "I think I ought to get a job in Bulawayo. I could come here weekends. I've felt all along that we didn't work things out on the right lines before we came." "Lou may be right," began Daphne. But Nadine decisively shook her head. "We're not splitting up. I promised Lou's father to keep her in my care and he gave me a cheque towards her expenses. In any case, with her running the place it costs no more to keep three than it would to keep two if Daphne and I were alone. And heaven knows we ought to be able to afford to have a visitor occasionally. I'm hoping that at the worst we'll only have to cut our stay short by a few weeks." "If that's all there is to it," said Daphne, "what are we anxious about? It won't be too interesting here, anyway, once Damon's gone. He said last night he might not be spending the whole of his leave in Rhodesia." A pulse beat queerly in Lou's throat, and she closed the biscuit tin with a snap. "Was Damon here last night?"

Nadine slanted a smile at her fingertips. "He's allowing himself to fall very slightly for Daphne. He came after dinner, ostensibly on his way to town, but he lingered about an hour, on the veranda. We haven't seen you alone since you went out with young Romeo yesterday afternoon, have we? You didn't know we're invited to tea and tennis at Red- lands this afternoon." Lou looked at Nadine's smooth dark head and at the pale burnished curls of Daphne. She drew in her lip. "Five is an awkward number," she said, "and I don't fancy tennis. I'll stay at home and catch up on my reading." The best thing about Nadine was her reluctance to pry. Lou felt the dark eyes watching her, she even tensed herself defensively, but Nadine offered no comment. She merely leaned back gracefully in her baggy chair and raised her feet to a stool which stood nearby, and Lou was able to gather up the tray and go. When Nadine and Daphne were ready that afternoon in their white pleated dresses, Lou paid each a compliment, and then went out to the lean-to shed which protected the jeep from sun and dust. James had cleaned the vehicle after her jaunt into Mlemba yesterday, but she spent some more time on it, polishing the headlamps and the windscreen. She heard a car pull up on the road, and was disconcerted, a minute later, to see Damon standing at the entrance to the lean-to. In white slacks and shirt, and with his back to the strong light, he looked big and handsome, burned brown by the sun. The thinnish, hawklike face was softened by shadow, but there was nothing yielding about his voice. "I saw your red head from the hill," he , said. "It's four o'clock. You're leaving it late before you change, aren't you?"

She blew a speck from the bonnet of the jeep. "I'm not coming," she answered. "I knew you wouldn't mind." "Tired out?" he queried sarcastically. "Maybe." "Was it worth it?" "What?" She feigned sudden comprehension. "Oh, you mean Val. We had quite a pleasant time, thanks." "I told you he had a line you'd fall for. You could have taken my word for that, couldn't you?" His mouth dented sardonically. "You can take my word for the rest, as well." "It's sometimes more fun to find out things for oneself. So far, you've only been partly right about him. The factual part." "From which I gather," he said, "that he didn't hold your hand while he unburdened. It'll come, little one." "As a matter of fact," she said coolly, "we did hold hands. Do you object?" "Not a scrap," he told her, his tones clipped. "I'm annoyed with myself, that's all. I was deceived in you — I can't think why. If I hadn't imagined you possessed intelligence I wouldn't have troubled to warn you against the insidious Val. Next time you two collide," he finished, his lips bent almost into a sneer, "he'll kiss you. But I expect that's another spot of fun you'd prefer to find out for yourself." She leaned through the open window of the jeep and rubbed the duster over the dashboard. "You detest Val, don't you?" she said in a

steady little voice. "It's beyond everything — the great Damon Thorpe bothering to hate someone so insignificant." "My dear girl," he answered with exasperating calm, "Valentine Marston hasn't the power to inspire hate in anyone. I'd even go so far as to say he hasn't the power to inspire love, either. George's feeling for him is' blunt and brotherly, and yours is, or will be, soft and pitying. I thought you had the sense to be saved, but you evidently intend to go ahead and hurt yourself." His tones sharpened with irritation. "Stop ticking about with that rag and go indoors and change!" Her eyes widened and gazed at him across the nose of the jeep. Whom did he think he was ordering about? If he imagined it would get him anywhere with Lou Meredith she would prove him mistaken! Yet even in the moment that she defied the green glance her will weakened; she shivered and looked away. "There's George and Nadine, you and Daphne. I'd feel odd man out," she said. "No, you won't. I've invited two men and another woman. Eight altogether. Come on, Louise," he said with a brusque, unsmiling charm. "Try to forget for a while that you've taken on the job of acting cushion to Val Marston. If we're going to be neighbours for another couple of months you'll have to get used to my nasty ways." "You might be accommodating and mend them a little." "I'm too old to change. You'll take me as I am, and like it. Now cut along." She hung the duster over a hook and came round to where he stood. She had meant to pass him, of course, and go into the house, but Damon's hand came up and she hesitated. She felt him take a handful of the shining red-gold hair, and the gentle pull with which

he made her look up at him. And oddly, though this was Damon Thorpe whom she had thought cold all through and cynical about women, she was not surprised when he grinned and touched his mouth to her temple. A little frightened, but not surprised. "That was a bit out of character, wasn't it?" she managed. "It's the unexpected that spices a character. Didn't you know that?" "How am I supposed to react?" He was smiling mockingly. "How do you feel like reacting?" Supposing she had the courage to tell him the truth. Supposing she whispered, "I want you to hold me, Damon. I just want to lean against you; nothing else — just to lean against you." It would probably strike him as mighty funny. He was experimenting, just as, when he went riding, he experimented with Daphne. Made her jump because he knew her natural inclinations were all against it; and today he was going to force her to play tennis. He had somehow got the impression that' Lou was half afraid of the mildest preliminaries to lovemaking. As indeed she was, but it was the delicious kind of fear, the fear which is every woman's when she is on the brink of new ecstatic knowledge. His hand had moved to her shoulder, dropped unostentatiously back into his pocket. "I take it you're left speechless," he said with a hint of curtness. "You'd better get busy. It's late." Lou did not go to the front of the house with him. She edged past him and round to the back. Quickly she washed and got into white shorts and shirt. She used a little makeup and took her racquet from its press, half hoping that the changes in climate would have

snapped a few strings. But they were all intact, and she had no option but to collect her yellow cardigan and go through to the veranda, where the others were waiting. Nadine pushed up from her grass chair. "Good news, Lou," she said. "I've just cadged an ice-box from Damon, and he promises to send us a block or two of ice from his own fridge with the milk each morning. Isn't it wonderful" — with a crooked smile — "to be blessed with a wealthy neighbour who has no wife to curb his generosity !" "Just think," Damon added with satire, "how fortunate it is for all of us that you should come to Mlemba just now. Six months either way and I wouldn't be here." Daphne, standing close to him, raised her china blue eyes. "Yet don't you somehow feel that we were all meant to meet?" Her glance did not waver from him as she reiterated, "Don't you, Damon?" "Yes, I do," he said, as if he were speaking only to her. Then, to all of them, "None of you are behaving as if you're keen for a game of tennis, but I intend to get you on the run, nevertheless. To the car, ladies." Lou sat in the back with Nadine. She didn't know why Nadine patted her knee as they moved off up the road, but it was a comforting gesture and helped her to relax. She saw Redlands for the first time by daylight, the great clusters of purple and cerise which covered the pillars and most of the roof, the crazy-paved courtyard with portulaca flowering between the stones and the long, low house against the trees. As soon as they had been introduced in the veranda to the other three guests, George poured tea and offered an assortment of

cookies which, he explained, was their weekly bake supplied by a local farmer's wife. "Damon smokes with his tea, but I enjoy a cake — which probably accounts for my being slower and heavier than he is." "It probably also accounts for your being so domesticated," said Nadine kindly. "You pour beautifully, George." "Thanks." He grinned and gave her one of her own tolerant nods. "But I expect you serve cocktails better than I do. Try a jam tart. It will remind you of the days you've grown out of - when you loved the simple things." With part of her mind Lou listened to their nonsense. George and Nadine couldn't meet without getting at each other, but there was mostly a vein of humour in their exchanges. The rest of her attention encompassed Damon, Daphne and the others. Presently Damon said, "We'll have to move if we're going to get in a couple of games before the light goes. Come on, four of you, and I'll get you fixed up." Five of them went off, leaving George, Nadine and Lou. Damon, Lou noticed, was walking with Daphne, who looked really lovely with that silky hair barely brushing the collar of the loose, powderblue jacket which came just short of the hem of her brief white frock. Her long slim legs moved gracefully, even in tennis shoes and socks. Daphne was apparently being amusing, for Damon was looking at her with a half-smile which was ready to break into a laugh. Where Nadine and Daphne were concerned his smile wasn't at all rare.

The group turned a bend in the path and only their voices came back on the breeze: a remark in masculine tones and a scandalized, exuberant exclamation from Daphne. Lou jumped up. "May I walk in the garden, George? It smells so sweet." "Of course. I'll show you the summer house and the rockeries." "Let me explore alone ... please!" Nadine pressed deeper into her chair. "Let her go," she said. "She'll be happier without you, George." Lou left them quickly and took the path to the right. She came to the grove of dwarf oranges and walked on, down towards the thatched rondavel which was presumably the summer house. She had to be alone yet was scared of solitude because it would etch in relief the horrid truth - that she was allowing herself, without any real struggle, to fall in love with Damon Thorpe.

CHAPTER V FOR several minutes after Lou had vanished round the corner of the house, Nadine and George smoked tranquilly. The sun had gone from this side and the veranda was warm and dim, the still air conducive to somnolence. Nadine glanced about her for an ashtray, and dropped her cigarette into the metal one which George pushed close on the tea table. "I wish it would rain," she said. "I'm afraid it won't. The rains aren't due for several weeks, and they're often late at that. Why are you longing for rain?" "For a change, I suppose. A change of weather sometimes alters one's luck." Already George knew better than to show concern. "Is your luck out at the moment?" he asked casually. "Not really. I dragged Daphne and Lou out here, and I feel they're my responsibility. Daphne's no problem - she'd get by anywhere because she's not troubled with much conscience - but Lou's more difficult." "Personally," said George, "I'd sooner deal with Lou than with either of you two others. There's no sham about that child." Nadine looked at him sideways, through half-closed lids. "So that's the way you see us," she commented sweetly. "Dear George!" "To be frank," he said, "I see beyond the sham — not Daphne's, but yours." "How interesting."

"It is, rather. Would you like to hear the findings?" "It might help to pass a moment or two." George propped an elbow on the table and looked her over thoughtfully. "How long did it take you to build that armour? Eight ... ten years? What was he like, Nadine?" "You're crazy," she answered, "and exceedingly trite." "But not far from the truth." His voice went very quiet. "How did you lose him?" She pulled in her lip between her teeth, made it turn pale under the carmine. Then she replied stiffly, "It was nothing - only the very beginning of an affair. I was a few months older than Lou is now. We met, and within days he was killed in a car crash. We hardly knew each other, yet the sense of loss was unbearable." She left the words in the air as though there were much more to follow, but they trailed off into silence. "So you decided never to lay yourself open again," he said at length, softly, "and became a career woman." "Give me a cigarette," she said abruptly. And, after it was between her lips, "Heaven knows why I told you that. I've , never told anyone else." "It's safe enough with me," he said. "I'm glad I wasn't wrong about you." "You're certainly wrong about me now," she returned in a hard voice. "I haven't thought about that callow romance for years, and it has nothing to do with my present conduct."

"As a matter of fact your present conduct is based on nothing else," he told her companionably, "but let it pass. Have a light. Cigarettes smoke better that way." She leaned to the flame he had been holding for some time and puffed a grey cloud. "Shall we go down and watch the play?" "Not yet. I've something to ask you. Don't panic" - as she shot him a rapier-like glance - "I'm not going to propose to you. I haven't that type of conceit." He put both forearms on the table and leaned towards her. "Quite simply, it's this. I'd like to buy Four Winds — the whole place as it stands. I don't need the house; it's set right on the edge of the land, anyway, and the space it takes up is negligible. You can stay on there for ever, if you like, because I'd probably build right at the other end, farthest from Redlands. I want the land, and I want it soon." Nadine's fingernail flicked a shred of tobacco from her tongue and she turned round slightly, the easier to see his rugged face with the grey wings at the temples and the brown hair above his brow. "Is Damon in on this?" He shook his head. "I expect he intends to make you an offer before he leaves, but he hasn't mentioned it to me. I'm not competing with Damon - I haven't his kind of bank balance - but I'll pay you the valuation price, in cash." Nadine considered. "Are you aiming to farm Four Winds for yourself?" "It's for Val," he said. "He's learned a lot and now he's chafing for a place of his own. Naturally, he'll need my help, and I can give it easily if he adjoins Redlands." "Will Damon like having him so near?"

Had George been the kind to display his feelings he would have winced; being George, he merely traced a pattern on the tea cloth with a spoon. "You seem to have guessed that Damon and Val don't quite get on together," he said. "At this stage it isn't important. Damon will be going back to Malawi, and by the time he's ready to live here permanently, Val will have an established farm of his own, and probably a wife as well. Damon's not vindictive; he just doesn't understand Val. He'll be friendly enough when the boy has proved himself a good farmer." Nadine permitted herself a small indiscretion. "You're very fond of your brother, aren't you? You feel you must put him on the right road, whatever the cost. That's how I am about Lou." "Are you?" He looked up now, keenly. "Then that's another reason why you should let me buy Four Winds. I had lunch with Val at the hotel today and he appears to be floored by Lou. He's never been like that about a girl and I'm sure it's serious. I hope so." He paused, and carefully excluded the enthusiasm which had risen to his voice, "I expect you're as anxious as I am to encourage young love. It rests with you, Nadine. I'll pay the market value for Four Winds, or you can hang on and get a better price from Damon." She stared out at the clipped shrubs which bordered the winding path that led to the tennis court. She was thinking of Lou, of the way she had smiled when Val was around and later wilted on coming into contact with Damon. Something rather odd there, though Damon possibly did have that effect on the young and inexperienced. Nadine was uncertain about Val Marston. It had occurred to her earlier, when he had been pleasant over coffee and biscuits, that he had neither the physical nor mental stamina of George, and apparently he was willing to appropriate his brother's capital without a murmur. There seemed to be no question of the young man

starting a farm which he would eventually share with George; Four Winds was to be Val's. George, she reflected, was an idealizing fool. He had sweated in the tropics to put in a fair amount of hard work at Redlands for a salary, and now, at forty, he was blandly contemplating splashing his savings on a venture for Val. It spelled sentimentality, not common sense, but that was his own business. Nadine came back to Lou. At twenty a girl is ready for love and marriage. Val was young and keen on farming, and George would be on hand to give counsel and affection. The younger Marston wasn't exactly the man she would have chosen for Lou, but he had the essentials: youth, ardour and singleness of purpose. And in marrying her he would make her safe from the fascinations of men like - well, like Damon — and from women like her stepmother, who could hurt. He would give her the kind of home and interests she needed. So long as, she loved him enough, it was unlikely that Lou would lose anything by marrying Val. "Well," said George pleasantly, "will you think it over?" "About selling the farm, yes. But I won't try to push Lou into marriage. To be absolutely honest, George, I don't think your brother is good enough for her." A faint flush darkened his tan. "I know, but she's as human as the rest of us. My mother was a good woman and Val adored her and would have done anything for her. Lou wouldn't ask more than that." "If she loved him, she'd make no demands at all." Nadine tapped ash into the tray. "You may have detected a buried fact or two about me, George, but you know nothing whatever about girls of Lou's age. To you, she's a feminine Val, to be guided and pampered into believing

that you know what's best for her. Actually, you may not even know what's best for Val. In any case, Lou is more independent than he is and she has the stronger personality. Val has charm, but he hasn't strength." "You talk like Damon," he said. "You both have the gift of objective reasoning, and you're apt to depose anyone who acts from the heart rather than the head. All right" - with a shrug - "Lou pleases herself. I still want Four Winds." "T don't see why you shouldn't have it," she said. "I'll let you know definitely in a couple of days." Her almost ruthless directness had alienated them. Nadine felt the estrangement and analysed it detachedly. Val came first with his brother. The "boy" was twenty-six, but for some reason George was driven to look after him and plan his future. First, Val had had "a mother upon whom he depended for most things, and now he turned to George. George Marston was the placid, gentle kind, and possibly he had hoped to stir her to sympathy. That was why he had started off on the personal note. A poor trick, really; she had expected better from him. She disposed of her cigarette and got to her feet. "Let's go to the tennis court," she said. "I expect Lou's there already."

As it happened, Lou wasn't there; she was in the summer house. She had paused outside the adobe structure and abstractedly turned the handle of the door. It had opened inward, revealing a circular room for which wicker furniture had been specially made, a curved bookcase that fitted the curved walls, and a low fruitwood table. She noticed the high windows with their plastic venetian blinds, was

astonished at the coolness and spaciousness, the atmosphere of studious luxury. Then a movement caught her eye, and she stood very still, watching the small, frightened animal which lay on a folded blanket in the seat of one of the chairs. It lifted its head but made no noise. Carefully she moved towards it, and with a light forefinger stroked the black nose. The body was beige and faintly striped, the legs long for so small a creature, and one of them was tightly bandaged from flank to paw. Some tiny species of buck, she supposed, which George had brought home for doctoring. She knelt, dipped her fingers into the bowl of milk that stood on the floor and moistened the small mouth. A pink tongue licked, the soft brown eyes watched her, begging for more. She slipped a hand under the bony little shoulder and raised him so that he could lap at the bowl, but he was too young to make a good job of feeding himself. The milk splashed her shorts and the polished stone floor. Lou laughed softly. Poor mite! How odd he must feel, all closed in and no mother to put him right. But he was safe and snug in here. She remained beside the chair, on her knees, smoothing the downy coat and whispering an occasional endearment, till George walked in. He came over and smiled down at her. "So you found the patient. Cute, isn't he?" "He's sweet. Where did he come from?" "You needn't whisper. He's been here three days and he's hot a bit shy. Damon brought him home. The little beggar dashed from the bush under the horse, and he was so young that his leg got bent - a greenstick fracture. He'll soon be right and then we'll let him loose."

"What is he?" "Steinbok - about ten days old." "Who fixed his leg?" "Damon. He has a way with animals." Lou's smile faded. "He has a way with everyone." She let him help her to her feet, before she added hesitantly, "I ... I'd like to talk to you, some time. I need advice, and you're the only one I can approach." "In a jam of some sort?" he asked quickly. "No, nothing like that." She moved a step or so away from him. "George, I have to earn some money." He gave a brief laugh of relief. "For a moment I thought a dozen things - all of them horrible. Why the sudden need for cash - or is it something personal?" "It's only personal insofar as one has to live and the money I brought with me has practically run out. You see, everything here has been much more expensive than we anticipated. We didn't know that Four Winds was just barren acres, and we imagined ourselves living off farm produce and only having to buy flour and sugar and other oddments. ' I'm not complaining. I like the funny old iron house and the windmill and the hump of the mountain against the sky, but I've had my holiday and I want to work. Is everything on a farm slow to mature? Couldn't I start salad- growing or poultry-keeping and show a fairly quick return?"

"Poultry is the better idea of the two — you can always get a good price for table chickens and eggs - but to do it on a worthwhile scale would take time and money." He stopped suddenly. "I've an idea which has nothing at all to do with farming. Interested?" "Of course!" He moved back and leaned against the wall. "How would you like to run a private bus service in Nadine's jeep?" "Don't be enigmatic, please." "I'm not. There's a school in Mlemba which the local youngsters attend five days a week. They have to be taken in by car from distances up to thirty miles, at a colossal waste of time and petrol. The parents would gladly pay you well to pick up those kids around eight a.m. and take them home every day at one-thirty. Incidentally, you'd collect your vegetables free. They'd be bound to heap you with their surplus produce." "Really?" She gazed at him in delight. "Can it be arranged?" "I'll sound them down at the hotel tomorrow." "You're an angel, George." "With tattered wings," he said. "Try it out, anyway. If it doesn't work you can drop it." "I think Nadine will agree. She bought the jeep cheaply at the coast when we landed because she thought it would be useful on a farm and save huge train fares besides. I'll bet it never occurred to her that it might come in handy as a bus." He turned his head as if giving most of his attention to the baby steinbok, which had comfortably closed its eyes. His tone was

almost offhand. "I came to fetch you for tennis. The others were near the end of their game." Lou took a last glance at the dozing gazelle, and turned towards the doorway. George came beside her and laid a brotherly arm across her shoulders. "You look good against the Rhodesian background," he said. "I can't imagine you anywhere else." "I don't go too badly with bookshelves," she answered with an unconvincing flippancy. "I may get my job back when I go home." Coming out into the late sun they were face to face with Damon. Without haste, George withdrew his arm from her shoulder and pulled shut the door. "I found Lou crooning to Bambi," he said. Damon appeared uninterested. "If you're going in for your own racquet, will you bring mine?" "Sure, and I'll pick yours up from the veranda, Lou." George veered towards the house and Damon stalked at Lou's side, making her conscious of her smallness and insignificance. "The baby buck is a darling," she said. "I fed him some milk and he actually went to sleep while George and I were talking." "What did you talk about - the thrills of living on a small farm in Rhodesia? The life might suit you, at that." "I know you don't mean it as a compliment," she answered, "but I'll take it that way." Somehow, she couldn't converse normally with Damon, and to tell him about George's scheme for transporting the

children to school would be to invite opposition. So she tacked on, "I thought George must have brought home the steinbok. It doesn't sound like you." "How would you know?" he asked evenly. "What is there about me that suggests I might prolong the suffering of a dumb creature?" "I didn't imply that. I can imagine you deciding the poor little chap was useless, and shooting him." "Maybe I didn't happen to be carrying a gun," he said coolly. They were in sight now of the wired-in tennis court, and he added brutally, "After a morning out with Val and a fraternal session with George - not to mention an energetic hour of polishing the jeep you're somewhat the worse for wear. You'd better partner me. George might expect some co-operation." She sighed. "You're such a beast, Damon. Is it a sort of revenge for being so much alone in Malawi that drives you to hurt people when you get among them?" He glanced at her sharply. "No," he said, "it isn't that at all. There's a quality in you - a lavish tenderness and a foolish courage - that makes me want to bruise you into awareness before it's too late. I've no craving to hurt you, but if you don't soon show some sense I'll do it even more thoroughly." "What do you mean by... sense?" "You know well enough. Get the right slant on this vacation in Rhodesia. You're here for a few months and you don't have to send out roots. You'll meet people and have good times, but the whole thing is transient, and you should finish up owing allegiance to no one." He had slowed nearly to a standstill. "I'm advising you for your own good."

"Fathers have been doing that down the ages," she told him, trying to exclude bitterness from her voice, "but the quest for experience goes on. Your experience is no good to me, Damon; nor is Nadine's, nor anyone else's. I should think you'd be the last to deny me the few knocks that one gathers on the way to maturity." "There's more than one road to maturity," he replied decisively. "With the right man you could travel it beautifully — in spite of the freckles." "Oh," she said hollowly, ignoring the hint of humour, "are we back to that? You know, it would be much kinder if you let us alone at Four Winds. None of us is the grateful, worshipping type, and you're really wasting your time." "Possibly - but with Daphne, at least, it's a mighty pleasant method of wasting time," he returned mockingly. "I generally finish the things I start, so I'm afraid you'll have to put up with it, Louise. Here comes our friend with the racquets. Smile prettily, now, for Brother George !" Lou hated him, his firm, lean jaw, the sardonic mouth, the sleek head, even his hard-thewed arms glinting with golden hairs. The unshakable Damon. It was much later, long after she had made a wretched mess of partnering him at tennis, had sipped a cocktail and climbed back into the car for home, that Lou recalled one of his remarks: "I generally finish the things I start." And he had spoken it while referring to Daphne. So he was beginning an affair, or perhaps it was already well on its sophisticated way. With Daphne one wouldn't know, because she measured the progress of friendship with a man by the value of the gifts she collected, and all Damon had so far yielded was the loan of

a gelding - a rather doubtful acquisition considering Daphne's innate indifference to horses. Lou had given up trying to reconcile Daphne's patent grief in England with her present uncaring acceptance of all die inconveniences of Four Winds. She had given up conjecturing about Damon and Daphne, too; it was profitless and painful.

Next day George called in to inform Lou that his idea had been well received by the two or three farmers he had spoken to at the hotel. They had promised to spread the news, and tomorrow she would probably receive messages from those who were keen to utilize her services. No doubt she would have to get busy on Wednesday. Nadine was in favour of the proposition but not enthusiastic. It seemed to her a trouble and a tie for small returns. "George is only doing it to make you feel happy and secure," she said when he had gone. "Somehow, I don't trust him as I did." Lou was amazed. "George? I'd trust him with anything. He's the nicest man I've ever known." "He's also one-track. Keep an open mind about him, if you can. That goes for his sensitive little brother, as well." With which cryptic utterance Nadine went to her room to do some work. It had become too windy to do much out of doors. It was a cooler wind, which at night brought a biting coldness for which they had been unprepared. They had become accustomed to the house sweltering at noon, and grown to look forward to the nights, when the corrugated iron creaked and banged as it soaked up what chill there was in the air and cooled the rooms. But midnight now was

frigid and the one blanket apiece not nearly enough, though Lou insisted she was never cold because Nadine had to be heaped with at least a couple of the travelling coats. Lou was terrified of Nadine's becoming ill again. It had taken her so long to get over that last bout in England, and she hadn't really had much will to get well; Lou couldn't think why - except that Nadine had stood so much alone that perhaps when her spirits were at their lowest she had felt she would not be missed. You could never get really close to Nadine, thought Lou, as she lay shivering in her camp-bed below a cutting draught from the window. She was wonderfully good and kind, generous to a fault with her money and apparently happier with women than with men, though she had often been heard to condemn her own sex as insincere. Lou had a wholehearted love and admiration for Nadine. That was why she got up in the middle of the night to make sure that her cousin's shoulders were covered, and in a roundabout way it was also the reason Lou herself caught a chill. It started with a sore throat and a feeling of slackness on the first morning that she was to collect the children for school. She drove up the road, past the gates to Redlands and on into the wilds. There were eleven children to pick up from seven homes, and she managed it and got them to the small schoolhouse with three minutes to spare. Groggily, and valiantly keeping her indisposition to herself, Lou got through the remainder of the week. Because she was young and resilient the sore throat cleared up and the shakiness left her limbs, but the malaise and depression hung on. On Friday night Nadine told the other two that George Marston was buying Four Winds, that he had already signed an agreement to sell at a surprisingly good price. She explained as many details as she

thought they ought to know and added the information that George himself was going to tell Damon. The sale had to be registered and approved before she would get the cheque, but she had agreed to carry on as if the farm were already his. Damon's boys would be withdrawn from clearing operations and a new lot put on to various jobs. Native workers' huts would be erected on a spot as far from the house as possible and George himself would supervise the men. Nadine's manner, as she doled out facts, was dry and emotionless, but Lou wondered if it stung her a little to be selling up the land from which her uncle had drawn inspiration. And why had she sold to George, not Damon? Daphne made a candid declaration. "It's the first time I've known you to act like an idiot, darling. Damon would have paid you twice as much, and it was only fair to give him first option. After all, he did mention buying you out at the very beginning." "He mentioned having offered to buy from my uncle, not from me, and it hasn't cropped up again. We can do with that money as soon as it's available." "Damon's going to hate your hide, my sweet." "It's done," said Nadine. "Damon won't say a word, because he deals in facts, and he'll be faced with an accomplished one. In any case, he won't be ready to expand till he comes to live here for good, and by that time George himself may be ready to sell out. In my opinion, we're very lucky, particularly as we can stay on in the house as long as we like. When I've properly realized that Four Winds doesn't belong to me any longer and that I have a substantial amount of cash coming to me instead, I shall be really exuberant." Nevertheless, Lou sensed a sharpness in Nadine that she could only attribute to regret. Daphne alone was undisturbed at the prospect of

Four Winds passing from its present ownership; her sole objection to the sale was based on the fact that Damon would have paid more. It was not till the following afternoon that Lou learned about Val's part in the transaction. Four Winds was to be registered in his name and within three months he would be finishing with his present employer and transferring to Mlemba. They were walking at the edge of the belt of timber when he came out with all this, and she could feel his nerviness and excitement, the tension to which he was once again keyed up. "You see how it is, Lou," he said in low, urgent tones. "The farm will be my own - two hundred and fifty acres! Once it's planned it will only need supervision. I'll be able to live as I've never lived before. I'll have time to study and play the piano, and to have fun. I'll have what I've always longed for — freedom." "You can't very well relax till you've repaid your brother." He looked at her oddly. "George won't take anything from me. He's so much older that he regards it as his duty to do all he can. Since I was a schoolboy he's taken the place of my father." "But he can't go on doing that. He has his own life," she exclaimed. "He may not always want to stay at Redlands, and if he's not going to share Four Winds with you ..." "He certainly isn't!" Val laughed jubilantly. "Don't you worry about George. He's so solid he'll always get through." "It seems to me," she said slowly, "that you ought to insist on a private arrangement with him - a proportion of the profits, or something like it."

The boyishness slid away into an uneasy smile. "He's perfectly satisfied with things as they are." "But he shouldn't be. You have a duty to him as well, you know." She had an urge to say something which would get under his skin, and then she looked up and saw that his eyes were feverish and full of entreaty, and her heart gave one abnormally heavy thud. Basically, Val was still a boy. He longed for her to be as pleased and excited as he was and to approve everything he did and said. Her own feeling of physical depression rendered her more sensitive to his mood, and she saw, in a moment of intense clarity, what it was about Val that made George willing to sink every material possession in a bid for the young man's happiness. This was the real Val, this fair, thin-faced man with the light, burning eyes, delicate nostrils and mobile mouth, this creature who was so perilously balanced between the heights and the depths. George was right. Val had had enough of torment. He must be made happy. She smiled at him and slipped a hand into the crook of his arm. "I've no right to speak to you like that. I was thinking only of George, and he, of course, is thinking only of you. He's a splendid brother, Val." "The very best." He stopped and pressed his other hand over hers on his sleeve. "You're so sound, Lou, like a strong, slim sapling. You've a remarkably clear mind, too, much clearer than mine, and you've a sense of justice. I'll do what- every you say about George." "I can't dictate to you, Val." "You can, my lovely," he said, and lightly touched her hair.

During the whole of that weekend danger seemed to hover near whenever the two of them were together. They dined at the hotel, spent Sunday morning on the mountainside and drove some miles on the Bulawayo road after lunch. There was a moment when Val, lying in the grass and looking down over the mountain slope, had twisted and rested his head in her lap. He had looked up into her eyes but mercifully left the moment wordless. No invitation had arrived at Four Winds from Redlands, so Val had an early dinner with the three women, thanked Nadine charmingly, and at about eight-thirty went with Lou to his two-seater. They stood one each side of the gate and he took her shoulders and stared down at the pale blue of her face in the darkness. "I've a feeling that the whole of life is just beginning," he whispered. "No more torment, no more loneliness." His grip tightened and she felt him quiver. "You're a miracle, Lou. I adore you." He put his hot cheek to hers, turned his head and kissed her lips. Then he wrenched away and slid into the car, to zigzag alarmingly away over the gravel road. Five minutes later Lou had not moved from the gate. Her heart was full and bitter, her limbs leaden as if her despondency had grown too heavy to bear. It was as well, just then, that she did not remember Damon's forecast that Val would kiss her next time they met. That really would have been too much.

CHAPTER VI WITH the sale of the farm an indefinable change settled over the Four Winds household. Nadine had finished all the commissioned drawings, and she spent most of her time conning over the big art books she had brought with her from England, and desultorily experimenting. Daphne, of course, had never had difficulty in passing the time, and her mood was rather sweeter than formerly because she was not compelled to go riding. Lou, practically recovered now, was kept busy in several ways. Once her spirit had revived she enjoyed driving the children to school. They told her about their homes and toys, and she taught them songs which they sang so lustily that everyone in Mlemba knew when the jeep was on its way. Also George had decided, at Lou's request, to build poultry sheds and runs near the house. In return for egg supplies and a weekly table chicken Lou would look after them for him, and by the time Nadine was ready to leave he would have Val's house well on the way to completion, and the poultry could be transferred down there. For a week there was no contact with Damon. He had a couple of guests at Redlands and would be returning with them to Bulawayo for a brief stay. To Nadine's enquiry as to how he had received the news that Four Winds was passing to Val, George answered, "He only shrugged and said he wasn't surprised. It won't make any difference to him." As the weekend neared again Lou dreaded the arrival of Val. She hadn't been well enough last week to withstand him, and she was horribly afraid she had permitted him to go just a little too far. Yet she felt for him a deep and vibrant sympathy. It wasn't Val's fault that he had been brought up by a loving and strong-willed mother,

nor could he be blamed for regarding George as a provider and mainstay. In a way, this last was George's own fault. Probably when Val had turned up in Rhodesia his appearance and nervous condition had been such that his older brother had simply melted with pity and affection. Lou could understand that, because in a lesser degree that was how she reacted to Val herself. It did seem, though, that George, a man of the rugged, seasoned type, should have managed somehow to discourage and lessen the tendency in Val to regard the world as his enemy. The manner of his mother's death had been stark tragedy, but if George had tackled him differently he could have been encouraged to live down the worst of it. What with one thing and another, Lou was becoming slightly agitated herself, but she did have the courage to take herself sternly in hand. That Saturday she went into Mlemba rather earlier than usual to collect chicken meal and corn which George had ordered. She made a few purchases at the stalls and walked down to the tiny post office to collect the mail. It was on her way back to the jeep that she encountered Damon. The big tourer pulled in under a tree and he at once got out and came round to where she hesitated on the narrow pavement. "Good morning," he said. "I've been hoping for a private word with you. Get into the car and we'll drive a mile out of town." "Well..." "It won't take long. If we stay here we're bound to be interrupted." She got into the front seat and he slammed the door. Almost the next second he was behind the wheel and letting in the clutch. Lou lay back in her corner, oddly at peace. In no time at all they were

through the little town and out on the sun-baked, dusty road. Damon drove till he came to a side turning, swung the car and braked in the shade of a big Zambesi teak. He leaned his right arm on the wheel and regarded her appraisingly. Foolishly, she wished she had dressed in something crisp and dainty; her slacks and shirts were fading and they made her look an urchin. An appealing urchin, had she but known. "You don't appear to be very chipper," he commented. "What's wrong?" "Nothing very definite. Don't let's talk about me." "When a woman says that there's disaster in the air. What's been happening?" He took her chin firmly between his fingers and turned her face. "Good lord, I believe you're on the verge of tears !" "I never cry," she said, not too steadily. "It's simply that so much has been going on that I've got a bit strung up this week." "Oh, yes," he said, the green-blue eyes watchful. "I've heard about your activities. I suppose you do realize your driving those kids about is illegal?" "This isn't England," she answered. "Everyone knows I'm doing it and no objection has been raised." "But everyone isn't aware that you've only a learner's licence." "The police know, because I asked them how to set about getting a proper one. They told me I'd have to take a test in Bulawayo, but I just can't afford to spend several days there."

His shoulders lifted. "You're not entitled to drive passengers till you have taken a test. I agree that the risks in this district are negligible, but laws are made to be kept. You'll have to drop the silly business." She was silent. She hadn't the energy to combat Damon this morning. Yet there was infinite balm, whatever his manner, in sitting here with him, breathing in his male fragrance and glancing now and then at his hawklike profile. "What are you thinking now?" he demanded abruptly. "Something even more stupid than usual - that in some moods you might be awfully easy to ... like." He laughed briefly. "As you say — something even more stupid than usual. I'm glad you didn't reach the outer edge of absurdity and substitute the word love for like. Are you trying to tell me that you find my company pleasant occasionally?" "Very occasionally. Mostly I dislike you intensely." It was true, she thought in sudden self-knowledge; she both loved him and disliked him, which surely proved that even her deepest feelings for him could not be quite genuine? She hoped so. His mouth thinned, but his tone hardly altered. "What do you expect from a man - always the brotherly touch or clinging vine tactics? I'm only your friend, Louise. I don't aspire to call you sister - or to place an imprisoning band on your finger." He paused. "You wouldn't believe it if I told you I'd like to see you happy, would you?" "You never do anything to convince me of it — but it doesn't matter." Her throat was painful, but she contrived an offhand smile. "What did you want to see me about - Daphne?" "Hell, no," he said with sarcasm. "I'd hardly enlist you as Cupid. For one thing your conception of an affair wouldn't line up with mine."

Her fingers locked together and tightened. "You're being deliberately cynical," she said. "Please get down to whatever it is." He was looking out at the pitiless heat trembling on the still air, at the wind-torn buffalo grass hanging dryly on either side of the lane. He let out a short, audible breath. "Been cold, hasn't it? The little steinbok caught a chill and died." There was a moment's quietness filled by the measured ticking of the clock in the dashboard. "Oh," she said softly. "Poor little scrap. I'm so sorry." They were drawn together in a shared pity for the bright- eyed, black-nosed gazelle climbing out of the blankets to perish in the midnight cold. She raised her head and found him looking into her face, studying her. "Louise, I'm worried about you, particularly now that George has bought the farm. You realize what he intends, don't you?" "He doesn't intend anything. He isn't cold-blooded." "Listen to me," he said, stiffening. "George has only one end in view - his brother's happiness. He's using up almost every cent he owns to buy Four Winds and build a house for Val, and he'll also use you, if you let him. He's not cold-blooded, but in this one thing the eventempered, easy-going George is a fanatic. So far I haven't talked to him about you and Val because I'm likely to get very hot over the whole business, and the last thing I'm looking for is a split with George." "Naturally," she flashed. "You'd never get another like him to manage Redlands."

"It happens," he told her roughly, "that I value him more as a friend — but let that pass. You're in a sticky spot, my child, and there's only one way to get out of it. You'll have to leave Four Winds." "I couldn't possibly do that!" "Yes, you can. I've been thinking it over and it's really quite simple. I've a married couple staying with me. They go home on Monday and I've promised to go with them. They live in a decent-sized house on the edge of Bulawayo and they'd be glad to have you for a couple of months. They belong to several clubs, so you'd have a far better time than you do here, and I'd be there at the start to help you dig in." A holiday with Damon! It didn't bear thinking about. "I can't park with strangers," she protested. "Besides, Nadine would be frightfully upset." "I'd explain to her, and I'd be absolutely honest with George. Don't you see what you're asking for if you remain here, at Val's mercy every weekend?" His eyes narrowed and glittered at her. "Isn't that why you look half-dead this morning - apprehension concerning Val?" "Of course it isn't," she flung back at him precipitately, forgetting her earlier dread. "I can deal with Val. In any case, I won't run away from him. You're making him out a monster." "He's not that. He's just a self-willed, neurotic boy who'll never grow up while he has George or someone like you to lean on. That George should impoverish himself for his brother is a big enough sin - but at least he's asked for it. You're merely an innocent girl dragged into the mess as a sort of stake for an ailing plant. It's a completely mad situation because we all happen to be friends and

unless we're very careful somebody's bound to be badly injured. It needn't be you, though." "You overdo it, Damon," she said in flat tones. "Val is nervy and he does take a little too much for granted, but he's not as bad as you make out, and there's a lot in him that's likeable." "Just a moment," he put in sharply. "What is he taking too much for granted?" "Different things," she said confusedly. "Such as the fact that you're going to marry him?" "It isn't a fact. I'm not going to marry him - but neither am I going to walk out on him. He's at a stage now when he needs plenty of help." "You mean support! He does need it, but you're too young, too easily hurt to give it. You make me angry — so angry that I could hurt you myself — physically." As he broke off he was breathing slightly more heavily than usual. She could see his anger; the sea-coloured eyes looked nearly black and the lean jaw was taut. She had once thought that if she ever did see Damon angry she would be frightened; but she wasn't. Instead she was vaguely pleased to witness the change in him from aloof mockery. "You haven't regarded this from my viewpoint," she said. "To you I'm just a child in peril, to be shipped off somewhere till the storm is over. But even in this country I have ties. I do the housekeeping at Four Winds, and I've promised to take care of a thousand chickens for George. And much as you despise my bus routine, I've taken it on and I mean to stick to it. I can't throw up everything because of Valentine Marston."

His teeth snapped. "The trouble is you don't understand what you're up against. George himself doesn't realize it. You're going to be disgusted at this, but I'll say it just the same. Val's a self-pitying parasite and if I could kick him out of the country I would." She looked down at the fingers still twisted whitely together on her knees. She was wincing inside as if he had touched a naked nerve. "You haven't a shred of humanity in you," she said low-voiced, and unconsciously added words of Val's own. "Since his mother's death he's lived in continual torment and loneliness, and now you'd deny him the chance of grasping at peace and freedom. I believe they'll make him a better man and certainly a happier one, and if I can help him to put the past behind him, nothing you can trot out will stop me." "Very well," he answered curtly. "I'll speak to George myself. I won't have you shove your head into a trap." "I wish," she said warmly, "that you wouldn't persist in treating me as if I were an idiot. I'm twenty and capable of looking after myself. What is it to you if I make a friend of Val — or even get into a muddle through him? I don't want your advice, Damon. I'd sooner take Nadine's any day. You make me tired." "That's two of us needing a rest!" He switched on the ignition and gave the starter a fierce jab. Almost imperceptibly the engine ticked over, but he didn't release the brake at once. "We don't seem to have got anywhere, do we? You're the great age of twenty and imperturbable. Short of marriage, Val can take what he likes ... which means that you're fond of the fellow and might even consider becoming engaged to him if he were a little more of a man. Well'' — he pushed over the gear lever - "we'll let it ride for a week or two. Not much can happen in that time." "You've done your best," she said.

"Not quite." His jaw loosened and took on a faint suggestion of gentleness. "I treat you as an idiot, Louise, because you are one. It'd be the deuce of a lot simpler if I were an idiot, too, because then I'd probably get you out of the mess by marrying you." She digested this before answering. "So you think it's only idiots who go in for marriage?" He pulled the car round and swerved on to the main road. "I'm not talking about others," he said calmly. "It would be stark lunacy if I were to marry you, that's all." She could find no reply to this, none at all. Yet the atmosphere of the car seemed to be loaded with all the things she might have said. But what was the good of expanding the subject? Damon was only stating something which was true for him and it would be ridiculous for her to question it. They were back in Mlemba, slowing because a span of sixteen oxen drawing a laden cart was turning from the main street along a track which led into the veld where native huts were scattered. It was a sight which at any other time Lou would have found picturesque and memorable, but now she scarcely noticed it. Damon said evenly, "Sorry I've offended you, particularly as I was about to issue an invitation before that last reprehensible remark of mine. Consider it spoken in jest." Having drawn no comment he went on, rather more sharply, "I want you to bring Val Marston to dinner at Red- lands tonight. Will you do it?" "So that you can get at him, as well?" "I was handling men while you were still in the kindergarten. If Val is going to be my neighbour I'll have to try, for George's sake, to break down the antagonism between us." He stopped outside the

hotel, opposite the busy little market. "Will you persuade him to come tonight?" "I'll try." "Tonight at seven," he said crisply. "I'll expect all of you." Lou was half-way back to Four Winds before she could think clearly, and even then her brain seemed to be uncertain which direction to take. Her heart, of course, was treacherous; it persisted in reminding her that she would again see Damon and the rambling, flower-encrusted house this evening. She would have preferred to go without Val, but the instant she had admitted this she repented. It was true that if Val and Damon could not be friends they would, at any rate, have to tolerate each other. Damon, whether he had wanted the Four Winds land or not, was now prepared to take the logical course, and she must help Val to realize that it would benefit him to be on good terms with Redlands. As she neared Four Winds she caught the acrid odor of scorched helichrysum, and when she entered the house she found George there, taking morning coffee with Nadine and Daphne. She placed her perishable purchases in the icebox and came back to the polite and chilly atmosphere of the living room to pour a cup of coffee for herself. "I collected the poultry food," she told George. "Good. We'll finish off the runs on Monday and I'll have the livestock delivered on Tuesday — it's coming from one of the farms. I'm including about thirty second-year hens so that you'll have a few eggs right away." He smiled at her. "You don't have to keep accounts, Lou — only see that James attends regularly to the feeding." He. pushed his cup across the table. "Can you spare me some more?"

Nadine sat regarding her slim crossed ankles and navy linen sandals. The book she had apparently been reading when George came in lay open but face downwards on her lap, and her expression was faintly bored. Daphne, deep in the lurid adventures of a countess and her gigolo, was practically insensible to the real world. George, Lou decided, had been anything but a welcome caller. As soon as their cups were empty she went outside with him. The henhouses were already in position about two hundred yards from the back door, and James, with another boy, was sinking the corner posts to which wire netting would be attached to create the long runs. They walked round the creosote-smelling wooden structures and stood watching the boys. Smoke drifted over from the burning weeds and George waved it away. "You won't have to put up with much more of this," he said. "Next Wednesday should see the end of it. Does Nadine complain?" "Not to me. After all, everything here is yours now." "She doesn't give you the impression she's sorry to be selling up?" "Of course not. She came to Rhodesia with that idea and, if anything, she's relieved." He nodded. "I suppose so. One couldn't imagine her digging herself into a farm." "I don't know," Lou returned musingly. "If you'd seen her flat in London you might be astonished at the way she's settled into Four Winds - yet she's no different here. Nadine carries her world with her."

"That's her trouble," he said somewhat abruptly. "Thank heavens you're not like that, Lou." She had no idea what he meant and forbore to make enquiries. For the present there were quite enough complications hanging around. She parted from him and called James to stow the chicken food where rats and veld mice could not reach it. When Val drove up that afternoon he was in exuberant businesslike mood. He was here for the week, he told her, to her private dismay. She must help him choose the site for the house, and they could draw up a design. It was a pity the cost had to be kept down to three thousand, but all the money could be spent on the building, and a tennis court and swimming pool could be added later, when profits allowed. Didn't she agree? Lou hadn't the heart to discourage him. Already, as the owner of Four Winds, he was maturing and becoming more observant and his proprietorial tenderness was by no means intolerable, even if it did remind her of "clinging vine tactics". It was with some restraint, though, that he agreed to go to Redlands for dinner. Had George passed on the invitation he would have refused outright, but Lou put it to him, reasonably, that Damon's friendship, however precarious, was something he could not afford to be without, and it was up to Val to look after his own interests, irrespective of whether he liked Damon personally or not; a viewpoint which was bound to appeal to Val. To Lou, that evening at Redlands 'began disappointingly and ended catastrophically. There were at least fifteen guests, including Nadine and Daphne, and with all of them Damon appeared much more friendly than he was with Lou Meredith. The amazingly good dinner had been planned by Babs Dennis, the wife of Damon's friend from Bulawayo.

Babs was a gay little person who loved visiting and having visitors. She had a head of crisp, short, dark curls, an olive complexion and pointed, vivacious features. She was about Nadine's age and her husband, a man of George's disposition, was a year or two older. Lou danced with Jim Dennis and found him very agreeable, but it was a lot later, after Val had had his brief and guarded exchange with Damon, that she had a word with the lovely Babs. The gramophone was playing and half a dozen people still danced in the lounge, while the rest had drinks on the veranda. Lou took a seat between Val and Nadine and accepted a tall glass from- Damon, who lounged just beyond the round table, almost opposite. Babs was talking of coming events in Bulawayo, throwing out the information that they had two spare bedrooms and asking, point-blank, if there wasn't a woman among them who would like to come along with Damon when they all left on Monday morning. "Jim has one of those soft jobs," she said, "and he's officially on holiday till next Thursday, so we could have grand times." She turned to Nadine. "What about it? I'm sure you could handle Damon." Nadine laughed. "Not I," she said. "Since I sold my farm to George, Damon and I are scarcely on nodding terms; I couldn't face living in the same house with him. Daphne's his girl - didn't you know?" Damon was grinning at Lou with a hint of malice and she thought, bleakly, that she could have been the one to travel south in his car and to stay under the same roof with him for a week. Perhaps even now it was not too late! But Daphne, from the other side of Val, said with sudden and suspect interest, "Ever since we came through Bulawayo on the way

to Mlemba I've wanted to have a real look at the city. I was amazed at its size and modern appearance." Lou's hands clung wetly to the wooden arms of her folding canvas chair. Did Damon know that Val was here for a week or more? Was he demonstrating, by that malicious smile and an uncaring silence, that Val's new enthusiasm had convinced him of his sincerity and good will? Had Damon given her up? Babs laughed delightedly. "We'll count on you, then, Daphne. I'm so glad it's fixed up." It was then that she leaned on the table towards Lou, and said charmingly, "I know you're awfully busy just now, but I do hope you'll come and stay with us some time. You and Val, perhaps." This was practically the last straw. Dew started at Lou's temples and her throat was on fire. Without glancing at any of the others she could have told how they looked; Nadine non-committal, Daphne self-assured and probably indifferent, George and Val pleased and vaguely possessive, and Damon ... well, Damon would still be smiling with acid pleasure in her discomfiture. Tacitly he was saying: Wriggle out of that and I'll believe that your only interest in Val is the humane one. Jim Dennis took Daphne in to dance, then George asked Nadine, so that those at the table were reduced to four. Babs was talking to Lou, asking about England, because it was five years since she had been home. In a lull, Val said, "Shall we dance, Lou?" Damon, producing cigarettes and settling back into his chair, looked quizzically from one to the other. "She hasn't the smallest wish to dance, have you, Louise? Take Mrs. Dennis, Val."

Val stared at him slightly murderously but bowed towards the older woman. "Why does everyone give in to Damon?" Babs exclaimed, getting up nevertheless. "The iron hand in the velvet glove," Damon exclaimed lazily. "It's very useful." He and Lou were left alone in the long veranda. The music which came through the open windows was Latin- American, and one of those dancing was singing in a false nasal voice to supplement it. Damon drew comfortably on his cigarette. "I must hand it to you, Louise," he said. "I had a talk with your swain and he's already becoming more amenable, less of a victim to the usual instincts which are uppermost in the rickety type. You shouldn't have real trouble with him for a long while." She was grateful for the darkness which hid the pallor of her face. She still felt a little sick with the knowledge that Daphne would be going to Bulawayo with Damon, and there was something else besides, something she would not be able to think about till she was quite alone. "You and I haven't anything to discuss," she said in dry, quiet tones. "If you hadn't been so keen to exert that omnipotence of yours I'd be dancing now with Val - and probably enjoying it." "You can dance with me instead." "No, thanks." "Oh, yes, you will," he said, and pressed out his cigarette.

She stood up quickly and unconsciously moved away about a foot, bringing herself up under the lamp which hung from a beam across the veranda. Her face had a sallow tiredness, and the grey eyes were large and bright with tears. He murmured a savage oath. "I'll take you home and tell the others afterwards that you acquired a headache. Did you have a coat?" She shook her head, and, because it seemed the only thing to do, went with him down the drive to his car. Nothing was said on the way to Four Winds, nor did she demur when he walked up the path with her and into the tiny porch. The door was unlocked and he stepped into the living room and struck a match. She brought him the lamp, and after he had lit it and set it on the table, she moved to the door, ready to close it after he had gone out. A sob forced its way into her throat and made a small sound. Before she could realize what was happening his arm slipped about her and his hand pushed her head hard against his shoulder. Her heart behaved queerly and her breathing jerked. After a minute or two he took her shoulders and pushed her gently from him. The hard lines of his face had relaxed. "I'm surprised at you," he said softly, derisively. Then, "Good-night, Baby Lou," and he was gone. And Lou was left to face the devastating truth — that she was in love with Damon, and wouldn't be able to go on living in the same part of the world for much longer.

CHAPTER VII IT was quiet at Four Winds without Daphne. Not that Daphne was noisy, but she was always the first to suggest playing a record on the portable record player Damon had lent them, and invariably keen to talk over the fashion notes in the periodicals which came weekly to Mlemba about three weeks after publication in England. Also, as Nadine pointed out, Daphne was as good as two people - herself and her diet. One couldn't help but miss them. When the mail arrived bringing only a letter from Lou's father and another from Daphne's old faithful, Tony Cottrell, Nadine grew quick of tongue and sarcastic. The sarcasm, when directed at anyone but Lou, became dry and caustic. Now it wasn't that she needed the cash a commission would bring; it must have been the sensation of knowing herself already forgotten that stung a little. But she was unfailingly sweet to Lou, and it was to please Lou that she consented most afternoons to taking a picnic flask and cakes out to where George and Val were working with the boys. The weather was glorious, the night breeze cool and vitalizing without being chilly. George said it wouldn't be so long before the belt of timber was clothed in new greenness, though it would take the rains to get the grass started. Wednesday was the final day of earth-scorching, and oddly enough it was the only day on which they had trouble with the flames. Had the wind been strong George would have known how to deal with it, but it was fitful; the strips of fire died out only to rekindle much later and cause a frenzied race across the land and the beating of flames with sacks and branches.

Lou could not sleep that night. She had a horror of the henhouses catching and the hundreds of new chickens being destroyed. There was also the risk to the thatch of the house. She tiptoed into Daphne's room to make sure, through the large window, that the two boys were on guard. The mountain, the trees and the blackened earth slept under an indigo sky in which a sickle moon cut a sharp radiance. The insects were not very lively tonight; normally the air vibrated with the shrilling of the singing beetles and cicadas, but smoke and heat had driven them away into the timber. Lou remained close to the window till her feet were cold, and then she went quietly into the tiny corridor. A rustling noise swung her round to face Nadine. "You gave me a fright," she said. "Can't you sleep, either?" Nadine shrugged her slim shoulders in the navy tailored dressing gown. Her hair was drawn back and tied with a ribbon, and without make-up her skin was pale as alabaster ; she couldn't tan. "Perhaps it's the beastly smell of smoke. Let's make some tea." Lou followed her into the kitchen, lit a lamp and set the kettle on the paraffin ring. Nadine got out the cups and as she placed them on the table Lou noticed shadows under the lovely brown eyes, though the narrow, well-cut mouth was smiling slightly. "It's ages since I last had a cup of tea at three in the morning," said Nadine. "I was so busy in England that I always slept heavily, but I'm often awake now for half the night." "Why don't you write to them?" coaxed Lou. "They love your stuff, really."

"To be perfectly honest, I've hardly any desire to work. I only wish I had Uncle Simon's convictions about my innate worth; I'd then set about creating a masterpiece." She gave an amused sigh. "Four Winds doesn't inspire me. I'm the cosy armchair and radiogram type." Lou measured tea into the pot and set it close to the kettle to warm. "Do you want to go home?" she asked. There was a pause before Nadine answered, without expression, "Not frantically, but I'm horribly tired of this shanty, and I would like to go places occasionally. There's nothing here for a gal like me, that's all." "Where would you choose to go - Bulawayo?" "I'd go up north and see the Falls first and then take a plane to North Africa." Nadine dug a spoon into the sugar bowl. "Pipe dreams, darling. I don't fancy doing anything alone, and you and Daphne have connections here which I won't disrupt." Lou lifted the jug of milk from the ice box and found a few dry biscuits before mentioning casually, "I'd go with you, Nadine. I've had enough of Mlemba myself." "You have?" The dark gaze was alert. "You mean you're needing a holiday from the place?" "If you were leaving permanently I'd do the same. James could stay on in his hut and look after the poultry. And I daresay Daphne ..." "My dear girl," broke in Nadine, "do you realize what you're saying?" Lou nodded, and took off the lid of the kettle; the water seemed to be taking an unconscionable time to boil. "I've given it plenty of

thought," she said. "We've had some good times here, but as far as we're concerned the charms of the district are more or less spent. Physically, it must have done you a lot of good, and that's primarily why you came here." "But look here, Lou!" Nadine spoke forcefully, her hand imperative on the thin sleeve of Lou's wrap. "Val thinks you're going to marry him - he's counting on it, planning his whole future with the idea of having you to share it. It isn't like you, to lead a man on and leave him flat." With relief, Lou saw steam begin to spiral from the spout of the kettle. She moved away from Nadine and half-filled the teapot. "I haven't agreed to marry Val - he hasn't asked me yet. I suppose there's something about him that rouses the maternal instinct, but there's also some element in his character which I find vaguely repellent." "Funny," observed Nadine slowly, "but he strikes me that way, too. I took it that because you were young you had more in common with him, and perhaps understood him better than I could." She sat down on the enamel top of the table and looked at Lou's small serious face bent over the teacups. "You know that George is counting, on your marrying Val?" "I guessed it - but I'd sooner marry George himself. No woman could ever find peace with Val; he has too large and distorted an ego." She poured tea and pushed the sugar bowl close to Nadine. "I think it would be best if George and Val shared Four Winds, and George married. It might provide the sort of background Val needs." "George is a sentimental fool," said Nadine unemotionally. "He wasn't bound to spend his every bean on a brother of twenty-six, and it makes me sick to see him doing it with such gusto."

Lou pondered, then queried cautiously, "Hasn't he ever told you the reason Val came to Rhodesia?" "No. What was it?" Lou hesitated. She hadn't been bound to secrecy and Nadine was entitled to know as much as she knew herself. So she said somewhat flatly, "Val crashed a car and killed his mother. It sent him all tense and temperamental, and George more or less dedicated himself to the task of helping him to forget." A silence ensued. The light was too dim to reveal Nadine's expression, but Lou felt strangely sure that she was shaken. It was queer, thought Lou, that they should be sitting here in the dead of night discussing two men who were doubtless deep in healthy sleep about five miles away. She stirred her tea and sipped. "Did George tell you?" asked Nadine. "Damon told me first, and then Val spilled the whole story. George never speaks of it to anyone, but I don't believe it's ever far from his thoughts." "Now that it's clear why that young man presumes society owes him an easy time, I'm more disposed to like him," said Nadine at last. "On the other hand, George shouldn't try to force you into marrying him." Her glance veered to rest on Lou. "My pet, I'm afraid you've slipped into a prickly situation. Even if you were in love with Val I'd do my utmost, now that I know more about him, to prevent your marrying anyone so unstable. Seeing that you're not, it's comparatively simple. Before he goes back next Sunday you must show him where he stands. And if he kicks up a fuss I'll go straight to George." "I'll manage it," said Lou quickly. She wasn't quite sure how, but she would. The chief obstacle was that kiss she had allowed him to take;

a man of Val's type would build on that, but she would have to be firm and strong. To Nadine she added, a hollowness in her chest, "We could pack up and go fairly soon, couldn't we?" "We'll talk it over with Daphne." She placed her cup on the table and tacked on unexpectedly, "I wish you'd told me about this before, because I'm horribly afraid that Val may let George down and his money will be wasted." "But George could keep on the farm for himself." Nadine's grimace was tinged with bitterness and disgust. "I don't understand the man. Ah, well, he's taken on his load of trouble, and he certainly wouldn't thank anyone for interfering. I'm going back to bed." "There's more tea in the pot," said Lou. "Hop along, and I'll bring you a second cup." It was nearly four before she got down into her camp bed; too late to do more than doze. The next couple of days were even quieter than those earlier in the week, because Nadine decided that they should drive into the country around lunch time and stay away till after dark; it was not cowardice, she stated, but merely one of the strategies of selfdefence. The first day they parked near one of the dried-up streambeds, and Nadine made sketches; and on the second day they chose to explore a sere piece of jungle which lay about fifty miles to the east of Mlemba. After having some tea from the flask, Nadine ignored all the startling wild beauty around her and chose to do a drawing of Lou. She had sketched Lou before, in England, but now she became more interested in the features than in the general youthfulness of her subject.

After a bit she looked at Lou shrewdly. "George Marston once advised me to paint a portrait of you," she remarked. "He thought you would present no difficulties because you're young and untouched. As usual in his diagnoses about people, the man's all wrong. You've more experience in your face than even I thought, Lou." "Experience?" Lou echoed guardedly. "Surely I have not so much that it shows!" "Nothing drastic, but you're not the merry child who set about making Four Winds fit to live in. Come to that, I'm not so frivolous myself as I was, and Daphne has changed, too." She laughed, without rancour. "It's those damned men at Redlands. We intended not to let them impinge upon us, but when men and women get within a certain distance of each other a chemical reaction is bound to be set up. Still, we have the satisfaction of knowing that if we're not as we were, neither are they!" "I doubt if Damon's altered much." "He is a bit different, though, probably because he's entered into our problems. There's something about Damon that I like very much." "I suppose it's the objective angle from which you see him," observed Lou soberly. "I expect he's a wonderful U.N. officer. You can imagine him palavering with Africans, hobnobbing with the Prime Minister and talking people into being inoculated with the same air of complete nonchalance." Nadine's smile was absorbed as she touched in the brows on her drawing. "These officials get that way. The greater their notions of humanity, their tact and impartiality, the higher they rise in their profession. They're a rare type; strong, relentless, impeccably turned

out and sticklers for progress. If they also have a sense of humour they're nearly unique."

Next morning Lou had reason to remember that talk. Though it was Saturday she had nothing to go to the market for because, as George had predicted, she had been loaded with oddments of produce by the parents of the school children, which would be ample for herself and Nadine for several days ahead. But she did need some brown cotton to repair a rip in one of Nadine's smocks, and the jeep could do with a fill-up and some wind in the tyres. So she drove into town and parked in her usual place, a hundred yards beyond the market. It was the end of the month and native women thronged the dim store, carrying wide flat baskets upon their heads and babies on their backs. Some of them were interested only in the crammed clothing counter, where they stood, still balancing a head-load while choosing flowered cotton for themselves or khaki shorts for their piccaninnies; the girls always wore their mother's cut- downs or frocks which white children had grown out of. When she watched Africans in the store or on the street Lou invariably formed hazy plans for all the good things she would like to do for them, but this morning, amid their gay chatter and earnest purchasing, she reflected that they were obviously much happier than she was herself. They didn't want help, only to be allowed to live their own lives. She bought her cotton and came out again to the jeep, to find a folded note held down by the windscreen wiper. Straightaway she thought she had committed a parking offence, but then she saw the absurdity of it; there were no parking troubles in Mlemba.

She opened the sheet of paper, saw the discreet official heading, and read: "Miss Meredith. Will you please come to the police station for five minutes while you are in town this morning. Respectfully, J. C. Heal, sergeant." Dropping the note into her pocket, she turned and walked along to the courthouse and down the lane at its side to the navy blue gate which always stood open. She trod the short path and looked into the square office from the doorway. Sergeant Heal, very smart in his uniform and with his sandy hair slicked level with his scalp, came quickly from behind his desk and begged her to sit down. To her surprise, he appeared almost nervous; his diffidence was very marked. "Good of you to come so soon," he said. "I hope you didn't mind my asking you to come here. I could have sent someone to Four Winds, but thought it wiser to handle it myself." "You're awfully mysterious, but something tells me I needn't be frightened." He looked at her- gratefully. "Lord, no. You haven't done anything very wrong, and this is the bush, not England." His last few words rang a bell; Lou was sure it wasn't so long since she had used them herself. "Have I committed a motoring offence?" "I'm afraid so, and we've condoned it. You see, legally, you're not even entitled to drive alone on a learner's licence — you should always have someone with you who is properly licensed. We don't enforce that in Mlemba because there's hardly any traffic to contend with, and it wouldn't be fair to the planters who've taught their wives to drive. We'd never come down on you for driving the jeep without an instructor, but taxiing these children is a different matter. You just can't do it, Miss Meredith."

"I drive carefully and there's not a fraction of danger. The farmers find it a tremendous help." "I know . .. but there it is." She pondered for a moment, then said, ''You're aware that I've been driving the children for nearly three weeks, aren't you? You've seen us - and said nothing." He ran an awkward finger round his collar. "I mentioned a minute ago that we'd condoned it, to help the farmers. But when we get a complaint from outside we have to act." "A complaint - from Mr. Thorpe?" The sergeant emitted a cautious, relieved sigh. "You knew he objected? In that case you can see how we're placed." "When did he see you about it? " "Last Sunday morning." Only a few hours after he had taken her home, and held her, and called her Baby Lou. Her fingers closed tightly round the reel of cotton in her pocket. "I must thank you for permitting me to go on for one more week," she said. The young man's relief became more patent, and he leaned over the desk, conspiratorially. "I heard that Mr. Thorpe is due back next Tuesday or Wednesday, so there's no need for you to travel round the farms during the weekend. Take the kids as usual on Monday and tell their parents then." "Thanks." Lou smiled faintly. "I'm grateful to you for winking an eye while you could."

"And I'm glad you take it that way." He nodded towards the inner room. "The boy is making coffee. Will you have some?" "I don't think so, thank you. I have to get back. Goodbye, Sergeant Heal. No hard feelings." .She had taken her fist from her pocket, but it was still clenched as she marched up the street. Damon and his imperiousness! She could have strangled him. He had guessed she would pay no attention to his warning and gone about the matter in his own inimitable fashion. She couldn't even believe that he had meant well. He was merely contemptuous about the whole thing and determined that she should not contravene the law. He had probably decided that in any event the transport service would have to cease when she left the district, and it was up to the farmers to get together and plan something more definite and lasting. He had not thought about her, personally; didn't care enough to pause and consider her side of it — the little money and vegetables she was able to add to the household budget. Well, as far as she was concerned it was the end. She wanted nothing more to do with him, wished it were possible never to see him again. Against this as her heart revolted, sickeningly. As she sat in the jeep, her hands too rigid on the wheel and her foot pressed on the accelerator, a wet heat suffused her body, and for the first time since he had left Redlands she imagined him with Daphne, facing her mockingly across the breakfast table, riding with her, lunching at the houses of friends with Daphne as his accepted companion, dining and dancing with her, and talking with her under the bright halfmoon. Too much private emotionalism, Lou found later, temporarily dulls one's normal feelings. When Val came in that afternoon and said he had booked a table at the hotel for dinner, she shrugged and said she

wouldn't go. The boyish smile faded and he went a bit pinched at the nostrils, but she refused to give in. Nadine veiled a sharp glance at Lou and casually suggested that he dine at Four Winds, and George, who had dropped in on his way to see someone in town, said he would like to even up the number. Without any enthusiasm Lou cooked a chicken and made a fruit sponge from tinned raspberries, and from habit she was polite and attentive all through dinner. It was over coffee that Val told them he must be back at his job by noon the next day; it was typical of him that he would not face the unpleasant fact of departure till the last minute. "I'll be along next Saturday, of course ... probably for good." George paused in the act of lighting a cigarette. "For good? You've given three months' notice. They've taught you everything you know. You can't walk out on them like that." "I can't stick it there, knowing there's so much to be done here. After all, this place is much more important to me now, and I'm anxious to get a cabin built near the house site, so that we can push on with the building. I can live there cheaply, and see that the boys get a move on." "But you have obligations. You have a contract with those people you work for, and they have the right to three months' notice. Quite apart from the inconvenience you'd cause them by leaving suddenly, the ethics of it, in fact, they're entitled to claim three months' salary from you; you know that." "They won't, though," Val said easily. "They're quite decent, but I can't work well for them any more."

Nadine wouldn't have dreamt of putting in an opinion, but she watched George through narrowed lids. When next he spoke her lips dented, cynically. "All right," he said with resignation. "I'll go out and see them. I may be able to recommend someone else to them soon." Val finished his coffee and got to his feet. "Let's go for a walk, Lou. I've a couple of things to talk over with you." "With me?" Lou hesitated. It would be easy to refuse him because he aroused no response in her, but for the same reason this was as good a time as any to show him exactly how they stood. "All right. For ten minutes." She went out to the veranda and down the steps to the path. As Val came beside her she turned to take the footpath on the Four Winds side of the thorny hedge. He caught her wrist as it swung between them and she thought, remotely, that in most relationships physical coolness meant nothing at all. She was as far from Val as if a continent divided them. "Won't you be glad when I don't have to go away any more?" he asked with gentle urgency. "I've so enjoyed this week that I just loathe having to leave tomorrow morning. You will be glad, won't you?" "For your sake, yes." "You sound horribly cool," he said. "I'm not doing anything for my own sake. You must realize that." "Come, come," she rallied him, without much humour. "Don't ask me to believe you're not thinking entirely of yourself when you refuse to work out your three months' notice. You're even willing to make George do something hateful to gain your ends."

His grasp tightened about her wrist. "You're not talking like yourself at all," he said in strained tones. "You didn't disagree back there in the living room." "Why should I? I'm not the keeper of your conscience. Do what you like, Val, and if it makes you happy, so much the better." "I don't get this at all." His convulsive grip compelled her to stop and she saw detachedly in the moonlight that his face was dark and probably flushed, his eyes even lighter than usual by comparison. "I wouldn't hurt you for anything. I was certain you'd want me to be near, to get on with the house. After all, the house is more important to me than the land itself, and I don't like the idea of leaving it to George." "Afraid he'll let you down?" she queried dryly. "He's the one person you'll always be able to count on, Val. He's given up all hope of happiness for himself — so that you shall have yours." "What on earth are you getting at?" he demanded pettishly. It was strange how she knew, so suddenly and infallibly. Intuition, perhaps — or merely an accumulation of details forming a solid fact. She said baldly, "Your brother is fond of Nadine, but by the time he has set you up here he'll be penniless." He stared at her, his jaw moving. Then he laughed on a cracked note. "How utterly absurd, Lou. George has no desire to marry — he told me so himself — and Nadine wouldn't marry a planter and settle in Rhodesia. She treats him as she treats me." His voice strengthened with confidence. "Darling, your imagination is running round in circles."

She was able unobtrusively to pull away her hand, and walk on. "I'm right - but you needn't fear that George will withdraw his support. You'll always be first on his list. You're probably correct about Nadine, but George will never know whether he could have made her care enough to marry him." For a while they strolled on wordlessly. Lou wondered if she had stirred him to self-contempt, and actually hoped she had. There must be some way of shaking him out of his absorption with himself. But when he spoke she realized her own impotence. The topic was apparently distasteful, and he had shelved it. "We've hardly been alone all the week," he said, "and I've such a lot to discuss with you. The most important, of course, is when we can announce our engagement." Subconsciously, Lou must have been prepared for this. She cast him a fleeting glance, then slowly turned to walk back to the house. Impersonally, she noticed that a lamp had been placed in the veranda, and she supposed that Nadine was there with George, indulging in a conversational sparring match. "I've given you no reason to think I'd marry you, Val," she said. Again he gave that curious, broken laugh, and this time it reminded her that he was hypersensitive and unable to cope with too much frustration at one time. So she added quickly, "You're not in love with me; you don't know me well enough. And anyway, it wouldn't be good for you to have everything at one go. You'll be taking over the farm and building a house, and that will last you quite a time. You can start thinking about marriage in a year or two." He grabbed her arm, as she had guessed he would, and jerked her so that she faced him. His speech was swift but by no means incoherent. "I am in love with you. I loved you the moment we met,

and I determined then to marry you. You've become the basis of my life, and I won't live without you. What is the good of Four Winds to me, if you're not going to be there? You are Four Winds. You've got to marry me, Lou !" "My dear man," she answered reasonably, "you're merely trying to bite off too large a lump of cake. Forget about marriage for a few months, and put all your energies into making a success of the farm. You owe that to George." "He agrees to my getting married, and he's very fond of you. I used not to care what might happen to me, but you've given me an object to live for, Lou." His breath was hot upon her forehead, his hand on her shoulder twitched and clung. "Oh, my darling, I know I'm not much - a chap who takes all from his brother and behaves a little unscrupulously by his employer - but I love you more than I've ever loved anyone." This statement hung between them and conjured a ghost. "Yes," he added unsteadily, "even more than I loved my mother. This that I feel for you is so different, so much more intense and beautiful." Is there a normal woman anywhere who can deliberately wound a man who loves her? Lou couldn't do it... not yet, anyway. She smiled at him sadly. "Give time a chance," she said. "Maybe it will show you that freckles and reddish hair wouldn't be too good to live with for the rest of your life. No" — pushing at him with the flat of her hand - "no kisses. They're hampering when you're trying to see straight." "I do see straight," he said. "A long, uncomplicated road which the two of us will walk together, serenely. You must marry me, Lou. It's the only thing worth having." She might have remarked that love itself isn't worth having if it inspires nothing in return; she was bitterly aware of that. Or she

might, in her comparative strength, have persuaded him to work out the three months' notice before delving deeply into Four Winds. She did neither, because she was tired and still emotionally numb. They were seen from the veranda, and George called, "Hadn't better be too late, Val. You'll have to be up at four." When the two men had driven off Nadine seemed willing to linger in the living room, but Lou put out one of the lamps and carried the other into the large bedroom. Following, Nadine said flippantly, "Engaging pair of brothers, aren't they? It would give me the greatest pleasure in the world to knock their heads together." "Me, too," Lou said briefly. "Good night, Nadine." For the last time Lou took the children to school on Monday morning, and while in town she bought some air letters and collected the mail. Nothing from her father this time and only a postcard from Netta, sent by surface mail while she and Charles Meredith had been on holiday in Devon. The card was dog-eared and grubby, and Lou speculated idly upon its six weeks' journey from England to Rhodesia. Probably it had been lying hidden in another bush post office, like Mlemba's. It was nine o'clock when she got back to Four Winds, to swerve round Damon's tourer and park the jeep. When she came to the veranda her heart was bumping against her ribs while she vainly willed it to close against the man whose pleasant clipped tones came through the open door. She had to stand still for a long moment before she could steel herself to go in.

CHAPTER VIII DAMON was lounging against the wall and drinking a cup of tea. He wore shorts and a white shirt and the crisp hair was rough from the wind. In spite of herself she looked, hurriedly and absurdly, for a difference in him. But his face was still lean and tanned, the greenish eyes still mocked and his mouth still twisted sardonically. "Ah, Louise," he said. "With your head like that against the light you're like a bronze chrysanthemum. How's it going?" "Very well," she answered, with reserve. "Hello, Daphne. Had fun?" "Heaps of it, and I'm not too thrilled to be back. Damon's inconvenient memory reminded him of something which positively had to be done today, so here we are." "We're glad to see you, anyway," said Lou automatically. "Tea, Lou?" from Nadine. "I'll have a cigarette instead, thanks." She took one from Damon's case and leant to the flame of his lighter. Anger against his invulnerability welled up in her, to be swamped in a tide of longing which was so strong that she feared it must show in her eyes. His nearness was a pain, and she moved to the table to leaf through a glossy magazine which Daphne had brought. "I must get along," Damon said. "Will you all come to dinner at Redlands tonight?" Lou replied swiftly, without thinking. "Count me out, Damon. I've had a busy weekend and I shall need my bed early."

"Even so, you'll have to dine somewhere," he said. "I'll call for you all at seven." Taut with resolve, she followed him outside and down to the path. He turned and simulated surprise. "Well, little one, what do you wish to ask of Damon?" "Nothing," she told him hardly. "I'm not coming tonight, that's all. I won't come to Redlands again." The straight brows rose, tantalizingly. "You're cross because I won't allow you to go on tearing around the countryside collecting schoolchildren. I'm sorry, but I had to do it. I hoped you'd be over the worst before I got back." "Well, I'm not! You're an overbearing horror, Damon, and you're too fond of intruding into other people's affairs. From now on, you'd better leave me alone." "Are you threatening me?" he enquired mildly. "If so, you're very unwise. I never have taken kindly to threats. By the way, how is the romance going?" Lou's shoulders lifted. "Just leave me alone. I don't want anything but that." He was still smiling, but his voice had taken an edge. "Putting things right is a habit with me; my training in the wilderness, I guess. Run along in out of the sun and have a nice sleep this afternoon. I'll come down at seven, and if you're in bed I'll give you just five minutes to dress. So long!" With a mere flick of the hand he went out to the gate, and to save what was left of her pride Lou at once hurried indoors.

Daphne had just finished reading the letter which had arrived from Tony Cottrell last week. "What do you know!" she exclaimed softly. "Tony's been left nine thousand by a fond aunt. The nitwit thinks it's enough to get married on. Practically the only thing I admire about that man is his tenacity." "Then why keep him dangling?" asked Nadine. "If I don't," said Daphne with a grin, "he'll marry someone else. If only he were ten years older!" "If he were he'd be nearly forty." "He'd also be taking a wonderful salary, my sweet. And, anyway, I like a man to be over thirty. Think of the chasm between Tony's character and Damon Thorpe's and you'll see what I mean. I'm afraid that after being so friendly with Damon I'd find Tony a thumping bore — quite apart from the financial aspect." "You'd never get Damon to throw up his job and go back to England." "I know; if I had any hopes they've been squashed during this week in Bulawayo. He loves lording it over them all in Malawi." Daphne gave a superficial sigh and smiled with rueful vexation. "Isn't it maddening? In most ways he's just right." Lou's anger with Damon had crystallized into something cool and hard. Looking at Daphne she saw her soft, indeterminate features, the floss-silk hair curling just above the collar of the slate-blue linen jacket in which she had travelled, at Damon's side, from Bulawayo. "Did Damon propose to you?" she enquired. "Of course not, or I'd be flashing a solitaire, and we'd have told you at once."

"So you'd accept him without being in love with him — just as you'd have accepted that man in London if he'd given you the chance." "Lou!" put in Nadine warningly. Daphne showed no particular emotion, but she looked up and queried patronizingly, "Jealous, Lou? Would you rather have Damon than Valentine Bright-eyes? So would I." "I don't believe you've ever been in love, Daphne," Lou said, with the same brittle coolness. "In London your pride was dreadfully damaged, but your heart wasn't even touched." Nadine spoke calmly but firmly. "We're not going to quarrel. The trouble is, we've been here too long. I don't think this place really suits any of us, and the sooner we get out the safer for our sanity. We'll have to plan what we're going to do." Daphne shrugged. "I've certainly had enough of Africa, but I'm not quite ready to go. When will you get your cheque for Four Winds?" "In a week or two." "Then let's put off discussion till it arrives." Magnanimously she added, "Sorry if I upset you, Lou. You're too soft, my dear, and it doesn't pay in this world." Lou acknowledged the apology and went through to the kitchen. Daphne raised her sleek brows at Nadine. "Jumpy, isn't she? What's been happening?" After a minute's reflection Nadine gave a few bald facts about Val, not, however, mentioning the tragic episode from his past. "He thinks he's going to marry her, but she doesn't care that much for

him. In many ways she's more courageous than you or me, but she just hasn't the type of pluck it takes to hurt anyone deliberately. I don't think she can quite bring herself to tell that young man exactly where he stands." Daphne's stare held curiosity. "What about you? Can't you do it?" "I'm in an odd position. There's George to reckon with - and he is buying the farm, after all. We can't handle this for Lou; she has to do it herself." "She'll never be brutally frank with Val Marston." "She must. I've told her so." Daphne shrugged. "There's plenty of time. She hasn't known the fellow long. We haven't, really known any of them long enough to get tied up with them."

Because there was no avoiding it, Lou went to Redlands for dinner that night and again later in the week, but she took care to have no private conversation with Damon; nor did she rise to his banter. Once or twice she caught him regarding her with lynx-eyed interest, and over the dinner table on the second occasion he demanded point-blank: "What's wrong with the food, Louise? Afraid of being poisoned?" "I'm sorry, but I'm not hungry." "To me," he said, "you look hungrier than any of us. Aren't you feeling-good?" "I'm fine," she answered. "Just not hungry."

"A girl of your age ought to be." Nadine interposed lazily, "Don't bully, Damon. You always treat Lou as if she hadn't a mind of her own." "Has she?" he enquired with sarcasm. "I got the impression that someone else was running it for her." His tone altered, became rough yet clipped, almost as if he were angry. Yet the question he put might have been prompted by concern. "Try some fish, Louise? It's trout baked in vinegar - you'll like it." Anything, she thought, to escape being the centre of attention. The truth was as she had stated: she just had no appetite. One couldn't enjoy food when everything around one was chaos. And it was getting towards the weekend again; she felt defeated, unable to face up to Val once more. Later that same night she listened to plans for a party on the coming Saturday. It was to be a musical evening such as Damon gave every few weeks while he was at Redlands, and he promised to rope in all the local talent. He took them into the music room, which none of them had seen before, and Lou realized it was actually an extension to the house which he had built on when he first acquired the place. It was a long room with a grand piano at one end and many chairs along the walls. In the corner farthest from the piano, packed bookshelves reached to the ceiling and to one side of them, under a window that looked out over the orange trees, stood a large linenfold writing table which appeared to be in daily use. It was a cosy corner in the big airy room. The following morning, when George called at Four Winds and found Lou alone in the front patch of garden, he straightway mentioned the proposed party.

"Damon's inviting Val," he said. "He wants him to play." Lou drew off a gardening glove and pushed back a reddish curl. She said musingly, "You don't like Val playing, do you P" "I don't mind." But he sounded exasperated. "Perhaps I'm soulless, but I always feel that a farmer shouldn't have a taste for Chopin and Stravinsky. The last time Damon heard him - a week or two before you came - Val let himself go and Damon got a rise out of him. Val has more control now - you've done that for him, Lou - but I wish you'd ask him to play something ordinary and unemotional." "Couldn't you persuade him?" George smiled. "He'd tell me to stick to planting, and you couldn't blame him. My taste in music rises no higher than the most popular classics. He wouldn't take any notice of me.' "He might not take any notice of me, either." George's laugh was affectionate. "No one else has ever influenced him so swiftly and completely as you have. I don't believe you quite understand how important you've become to Val. He changed from the moment you met, became more alive and smiling, and much more interested in life. Before that he was corroded by a neurosis ..." He stopped abruptly and the smile was forced into a conventional cast. "That sounds horrible, as if he'd been mentally ill. He wasn't, of course. He's told you all he's been through, hasn't he?" She nodded. "He's getting over it now." "Oh, yes." George was reassuring. "I doubt if he ever thinks back over those days. He's too engrossed with the farm and you." She said offhandedly, "The farm is a big enough pro-, position, to begin with."

"Not for Val." His expression a shade embarrassed, he added, "He's not like me. He's always had to love and be loved. Some might think it a weakness in a man, but you don't, do you?" "Of course not. We're none of us alike." This was her opening. She should have said, "but I don't love him, George. I don't love him, and I can't promise to marry him." The moment passed, however, and she found herself stooping to pull a weed and mentioning that it was time for a mid-morning refresher. Sternly she told herself that she was more of a coward with George than with Val himself. But that was because George had given up so much, had more or less beggared himself in a bid for his brother's happiness. She badly wanted to help him, yet couldn't.

It was late on Friday evening, when Daphne had settled to the loathed task of answering correspondence, that she made a startling discovery. "Good lord," she ejaculated soberly. Then quickly, in annoyance and excitement, "Tony's writing is the limit! That wasn't nine thousand this aunt left him — it was nineteen thousand. The one is stuck on to the pound sign. What do you make of that?" Nadine looked up from chipping at a lino cut. "What will you make of it, my pet?" she asked with amiable sarcasm. "Looks as if Tony may have hooked himself a wife." Daphne threw down her pen. "Quite a sum, isn't it? And Tony's not bad. He runs with a cheerful set. Don't you think it's better to marry someone you're not mad about? It puts you in a strong position and the marriage is more likely to last, particularly if he happens to be crazy about you."

"It might suit your type," Nadine agreed, "and Tony's not too deep, so he'd be happy enough. London's your back-ground, Daphne." "How I know it!" She sat with her chin in her hand, staring unseeing at the wall, and a smile roved the small red mouth. She gave a long, pleasurable sigh. "I wouldn't go back to work, but I might model for an artist now and then to keep my hand in, and I'd always be available if you wanted me, Nadine." "Would you give up Damon?" Lou put in hardily. "I'm attracted to Damon," came the pat reply, "about as much as he's attracted to me — which is considerable. But he'd want too much of any woman, and you'd always have the feeling you could be dispensed with. To be honest, I don't fancy it, but I'd go about things differently if I thought I could get him away from Africa." "As you can't you'll marry Tony Cottrell for his money!" "What an acid creature you're becoming, Lou. I'm not sure that I will marry Tony, but I'm glad I read his letter again before writing. He has four times as much money as I thought, so I shall be four times as sweet to him." She gave Lou a sudden, disarming grin. "You'd like me a lot better if you'd accept me as a hard-headed business woman who has had her failure and profited thereby. Nadine does." Lou jabbed her needle into her sewing. "It seems such a shame not ... not to be in love when you marry." Eyes downcast, she tacked on, "And it isn't really fair to Tony to marry him on the rebound." "A woman on the rebound has much more horse-sense than an innocent who's reaching for the stars. She's not likely to make a second blunder." "True enough," inserted Nadine. She took another little dig at the lino block and announced heavily, "I'm awfully tired of men, and

talk of men. What I'd like more than anything at the moment is a seat in a London theatre and a really luscious box of chocolates." "The nearest you'll get to that," Daphne told her blithely, "is an armchair in the Redlands music room tomorrow and a box of cigarettes at your elbow. Let's hope it won't be too highbrow." The afternoon slipped away quietly. All three of them managed a cool bath, and as dusk came down they started to dress. Lou was ready first, in a simple blue dress, and while waiting for the others she made some coffee and took the tray to the living-room. Daphne was in soft lilac with touches of white, her lips and finger nails an unusual shade of deep, dusty pink. Her pastel coolness was out of place in Rhodesia, yet there was something about her which blended with Redlands. So there was about Nadine, come to that. By the time George came to pick them up Lou had a decided feeling of bafflement and inferiority. All she could be certain of was that this couldn't last. She did wish Nadine would decide on a date for their departure. George put an immediate question. "Where's Val? I thought I'd find him here." "I took it that he was working with you somewhere," replied Lou. "Strange." He paused, his frown faintly worried. "I wonder if that two-seater of his has let him down?" Just a trifle callously, Nadine said, "If it has, he'll have to manage as you or anyone else -should." His glance slid over her dark hair and leaf-green slenderness, and was averted. "You don't understand."

"I think I do," she said evenly. "He's finishing at that farm and it's possibly taken him a little while to clear up and pack." His frown cleared. "That must be it. I did write to his employer, so there'll be no trouble there." "That's fine. It would be too bad if Val had to behave normally, like everyone else." Daphne broke in, "Heavens, are you two still at it? What is it about Nadine that puts your back up, George?" There was no answer to this. George held wide the door and the women passed through and got into his car. There were already about twenty guests at Redlands and within the next half-hour that number nearly doubled. Cocktails and snacks were served in the music room and lounge while a string quartet played Brahms. After that, everyone sat down to serious listening. A couple of singers gave creditable performances and a guitarist played a selection of light Latin airs. During the interval a buffet supper was eaten in the veranda and courtyard, and when, after an hour or so, most people wandered back to the music room, Daphne retained her chair in a cool dim corner of the veranda. She had had enough musical education for one evening. These amateurs took themselves too seriously and she couldn't think why they bothered; even in Rhodesia one could buy recordings of good music and listen to the B.B.C. She heard a car pull up on the gravel road, and wondered who would be arriving at this late hour; it must be ten-thirty. She looked towards the gates and gave a tolerant sigh. It was Valentine of the light blue eyes; the bone of contention between Nadine and George, and Lou's unwanted swain. He walked swiftly, his step eager, the pale hair flopped forward as if he had driven at speed in a wind.

"Hello there," she said softly. He veered from entering the house and stepped towards her along the veranda. "Good evening." He sounded bright and breathless. "Your boy told me you'd all come here and I gathered that it's a musical do, so perhaps I shall be able to dig Lou out of it, unnoticed." Daphne looked up at him, and her tone held a tantalizing challenge. "What makes you think she might want to be rescued? She's fond of this stuff." "I've got lots to talk to her about." "If you go in there," she said lazily, "they'll ask you to play. You were supposed to be on the programme." "I wouldn't play for them. I haven't touched a piano for weeks." He hesitated, though. "Daphne, will you ... would you mind..." "Take a seat," she interrupted him airily. "You'd better talk to me till it's over." Not that she had any inclination to converse with Val; his behaving as if people existed to smooth his passage through life was irksome to a woman who earned her own living. She felt she would like to give him a jolt. He sank into a chair at her side, but the awkwardness which Daphne always inspired in him kept him silent. He leaned forward with his arms across his knees and looked into the dark garden. The restlessness of his hands and that quickened breathing showed him excited and impatient. Impatient to unload a new crop of troubles and anticipations upon Lou, guessed Daphne. Poor Lou! How she suffered rather than take a stab at the young man's conceit. "I hear you've given up working for the tobacco farmer," she said conversationally.

"Yes. I've brought my stuff away; that's what made me so late. This week I'll have a log cabin built, and in a couple of months the house will be completed." "It seems to me," she answered reasonably, "that you could live in our house for a few years and save George the expense of building." He jumped up and went to lean against the nearest pillar. His head, against the night, had almost the ashen blondeness of Daphne's. With an undertone of uneasiness he said quickly, "You and Nadine don't realize what it will mean to me to be settled in a place of my own. Lou is the only one who does." "And George," she laconically reminded him. "Don't leave out dear old George." Quite pleasantly, she asked, "Has anyone ever called you a selfish blighter, Val?" "Don't!" The exclamation was angry and abrupt. "I love Lou and I'm going to make her happy. And if we're happy, George will be, too. It's no one else's business." Her shoulders lifted. "You're afraid of the truth, aren't you? But when Lou's gone, you'll have to face it." "When ... when Lou's gone?" he said jerkily. "What are you getting at? " Very calmly she stated, "You won't have her for much longer, you know. As soon as the sale of Four Winds has gone through, we're flitting back to England." "You and Nadine - but not Lou!" His tone was suddenly strained to cracking point. "Has something new turned up?" "Not to my knowledge."

He drew a loud breath. "You had me scared, but I ought to have known better. Lou will never walk out on me. We're going to be married." Daphne stared up speculatively at his thin, indistinct face. If only Val had had some of his brother's rugged charm she would have spared him. But what charm he had was of a taut, boyish variety, and seeing that he was the same age as herself - indeed, a year or so older - his boyishness rasped. Yes, it was time someone forced him to face his own shortcomings. Had Daphne known of the tragic circumstances in which he had lost his mother she might have been compassionate. But she only saw the self-willed young man who was making Lou miserable, and disliked him accordingly. A couple approached from the garden, and she waited till they had gone into the house before saying smoothly and clearly, "Lou doesn't love you, Val, so you've got to let her walk out on you. She doesn't love you, she's never loved you, and she never will. Got that?" His eyes went brilliant with anguish, his mouth tight with disbelief. He bent towards her in the dimness. "Has ... Lou said that?" "Not to me, but it's true. By harping on marriage you're making her feel absolutely wretched. Haven't you got more pride than to cling to a woman who doesn't want you?" "You know nothing about it," he burst out. "You don't know Lou ... you don't know me. I can't live without her." Emotion grated in his voice. "Why don't you mind your own business!" "My dear man," said Daphne, on a hard note, "I'm more fond of Lou than you'll ever be. You love yourself, Val, and you want Lou

because she'd make that self bigger and better. If you like, I'll be really outspoken and tell you that she's far too good for you. How do you like that?" He stepped back a pace and his hands went behind him, as if he were seeking the support of the pillar. Now she could only see those bright, feverish points in his eyes; even his lips must have been white. He spoke with difficulty, thickly. "I'll speak to Lou. I'll tell her what you've said. She'll hate you for this ... as much as I hate you I" He was gone then, along the veranda and into the lounge. Daphne took another cigarette from the box on the iron table and viciously struck a match. What a fool he was; what a vain, contemptible fool! She only hoped that Lou would have the sense to follow up, now that the ice was broken. Daphne got up and went out into the garden. He had left a disagreeable atmosphere behind him and she wasn't accustomed to putting up with that kind of thing. She walked right down the garden and came up slowly, on a different path. She had nearly reached the house again when a car started up out there beyond the gate. The engine roared, gears, ground discordantly and the car shot away, much too fast. Val, of course. She had upset him, and serve him right. She arrived at the door just as several people were coming out. Damon said carelessly, "Been playing hookey, Daphne? You haven't been alone, surely? " Nadine took a breath of the dry, night air. "I quite enjoyed your musical friends, Damon, but I think we'd better be going."

"Where's Lou?" enquired Daphne. "Yes, where is Lou?" Damon glanced about him at the gathering guests. "I was speaking to her five minutes ago." "She told me that Val had arrived and was taking her home." "Val? I didn't see him." "No," said Nadine with reserve. "You might tell George his little brother turned up; he was anxious about him. Thanks for a nice evening, Damon." He made a brief rejoinder, saw them into the car of another couple who were driving down to Mlemba, and said good night. In the back of the strange car Daphne looked at Nadine and away again. Neither commented on the fact that Lou had gone off without saying good night and thank you for the pleasant evening.

CHAPTER IX NADINE roused late next morning. As it was Sunday she lay for a while staring at the asbestos-board ceiling and wondering how many more weekends they would have to spend at Four Winds. This morning she felt she couldn't bear it if by next Saturday they were not beginning to make arrangements for the disposal of the furniture. It would be good to get back to work, though she was inclined to believe the saying that the person who has lived in Africa for a spell can never quite pick up the threads of former existence. There was an insidious charm about the country, a brooding warmth, an essence which must tritely be described as magic and mysterious. Still, she had found work the cure for almost everything. Not that she needed a cure now, she assured herself swiftly. She was merely feeling wry and ironical. She reached to the bedside table for her watch and discovered that it was a quarter past eight. A quarter past eight, and Lou hadn't yet budged to get the breakfast. Usually on Sundays she brought a cup of tea at seven-thirty and followed it up with a breakfast tray. But she was probably tired this morning. One way and another the musical evening had been exhausting, and she, poor kid, had no doubt wound it up with a scene; a long-drawn scene, too, judging by the fact that Nadine had gone to sleep before Lou had come in. Nadine threw back the blanket and swung down her legs. It wouldn't hurt to get up for breakfast, and Daphne might as well roll out, too. They would have tea and toast on the veranda and dress at leisure, afterwards. This would have to be a lazy day. She got into her navy dressing gown and went to the kitchen to put on the kettle. She drew a bowl of water at the sink and splashed her face with its luxurious coolness, and as she stood patting her skin

with the rough kitchen towel and looking through the window at the white grass which extended to the ploughed land that curved round the foot of the mountain, she knew regret and a queer longing which was difficult to pin down. Foolish, really, because there was little beauty in the view, and she had previously decided that Uncle Simon must have been crazy or else inspired from within. Shrugging, she got out cups and saucers and took the loaf Lou had baked yesterday from the bread tin. No use making toast yet, though, if those two hadn't even wakened. Nadine walked out into the tiny passage and called, "Lou! It's getting late. Are you coming?" And then, "You'll have to get up for brek today, Daphne. I'm just making tea." She received a murmur from Daphne but no sound at all from Lou. A trifle impatiently she went to the end of the brief corridor and shoved wide the door of the all-purpose cubby-hole. "Lou, what the dickens..." She broke off abruptly, staring. Involuntarily, her hand went up to her throat and her mouth parted with incredulity and fear. The thin green blanket on the camp bed was smooth and firmly tucked in. The pillow sat white and plump at the head of the bed and at the foot lay Lou's clean underwear, washed and ironed yesterday but not, for some reason, put away in Daphne's bedroom. The camp bed had not been slept in. Nor was there any trace of the dress and shoes Lou had worn last night. Nadine backed precipitately from the room and flung open the other bedroom door. "Daphne, did you hear Lou come in last night?" she demanded sharply.

The fair head rose, the blue eyes gazed sleepily, and Daphne yawned. "No, I was flat out." An alien urgency in Nadine's manner brought her upright in the bed. "You look like a ghost. What's wrong?" The dark eyes were large and shadowed. "She didn't come home — I'm sure of it. And Val's the cause. Daphne, I'm frightened." Daphne slid from her bed. "Now, don't let's be hasty. She may be out feeding the chickens." "Her bed hasn't been slept in." Daphne pushed fingers through her hair, frowning. "I believe you're right — it is Val. I had a talk with that young egotist last night and a short while afterwards he went thundering away with Lou." "What did you say to him?" "Well, I told him what you hadn't the nerve to tell him - that Lou hadn't any use for him." "Oh, lord," said Nadine below her breath. Then, with more strength in her voice, "You upset him and he took it out on Lou. Heaven only knows where he's dragged her." Daphne, shouldering into a maize silk wrap, said slowly, "I see what he's up to. It's a cheap trick, but he thinks it will work with a girl as simple as Lou. He drove her into the wilds so that she'd have to spend the night in his company, and the sap actually thought he could get away with making her marry him on the strength of it - in these enlightened times." "We can't be sure that's what he's done." Nadine made a visible effort to brace herself. "We've got to act. I'm going to see Damon."

"I'll be dressed as quickly as you are. We'll both go." "No. One of us must stay here in case she turns up." She was out of the door and almost in her own room as she added, "They may have some news at Redlands, and anyway, Damon will know what to do." Five minutes later, her hair smoothed down but rather less immaculate than usual, Nadine pressed the starter of the jeep and let in the clutch. Daphne had already opened the gates, so she was able to turn out on to the road and accelerate at once. She drove as fast as the jeep would go, her mind blank except for the grey cloud of worry. The Redlands gates were open, too, and she swerved between the pillars and round the drive to the courtyard. There was no one in sight, but a bag of golf clubs leaned against one of the posts as if placed there by a servant for his master. Nadine went to the open door and into the lounge. She saw her head suddenly in the mirror, and automatically ran a hand along the collar of her frock and over the knot of hair in her nape. But for once she didn't care how she looked. "Damon," she cried abruptly. Then louder, "Damon!" He came quickly, probably from a bedroom. For a second he hesitated in the archway between lounge and dining room, and then he strode forward. "Trouble?" he asked quickly. "What is it?" In spite of an almost iron control, a dry sob of relief caught in her throat. Trust Damon to jump straight to the point. She came out with it hurriedly but lucidly, knowing that nothing less would do for him. She saw a terrible sternness tighten his features, and his lip go between his white teeth.

"You say Daphne told Val a few truths about himself. Did she mention whether he made any threats?" "No, but I don't think he could have. I suppose he just rushed into the house and collared Lou. He meant to find out if Daphne had spoken the truth. Daphne thinks he purposely drove into the country intending to stay out all night - to compromise Lou." Damon snapped, "He's capable of it!" His mouth was narrow and cruel as he tacked on, "If he's been up to any tricks I'll break his neck." "What can we do?" He patted her shoulder. "You've done all you can. Sit down and have some coffee. George will be back in a minute and you'll have to tell him. Make him stay here with you." "But where are you going?" "First to the hotel in Mlemba. Then I shall make enquiries and follow up anything that seems likely." "Let me go with you!" He was already at the door. "Do as I ask, there's a good girl. Relax, and keep George here. I'll let you know as soon as I find out anything." "Do you suspect..." "There's no time to discuss suspicions." She was following him. "But, Damon ..."

"I'm depending on you," he said tersely. "Leave Lou to me. I'll find her." She hung on to the doorframe, watching him till he had vanished round the house. She heard him shout, probably into the kitchen window, "Jacob, take coffee to the lounge!" And almost at once his car shot backwards down the drive and out on to the road. It seemed a long time before Nadine could grope her way to a chair, but now that Damon was out on the trail she felt decidedly steadier. The coffee arrived and she poured a cupful and helped herself to a cigarette. She didn't want to see George, hated the idea of having to watch him while she told him that his brother had abducted Lou. Yet something in her, something quite alien to her usual complaisance, felt an almost vicious satisfaction in knowing that even George could not fail to be shaken by Val's latest piece of selfish folly. She stubbed out her cigarette and wondered, hollowly, and impatiently, how long George was going to be. And then she saw him through the doorway, big, rugged and brown, walking up one of the paths towards the front of the house. Nadine's mouth curled. He didn't look anything like the mouse of a man she knew him to be. He caught sight of the jeep and quickened his step; probably in anticipation of seeing Lou. Nadine jabbed her thumb over the smouldering cigarette in the ashtray, flicked the ash from her fingers and went out to meet him.

Damon, meanwhile, had drawn blank at the hotel. The steward reported that Mr. Marston had looked in late last evening to book a room and unload luggage from his car, but had not been back since then. No, they had no news of him at all. Damon slid back behind the wheel and sped down the road to turn left and pull up outside the

sleepy little police station. Here he stepped into a hive of conjecture, for Sergeant Heal was trying to sift some news brought by an excited and breathless piccanin. "Where did you see this? " he demanded. "On the road, master, the road to the farm where I live. I go back to tell my nkosi, and he lend me the bicycle and say go to the police." Unceremoniously, Damon broke in, "Has this anything to do with a two-seater?" The young policeman raised his head. "Why, yes, sir, it has. Know of one that's missing?" "That's why I'm here. George Marston's brother and Miss Meredith are in it." He clipped out a few sentences to the piccanin in Sidebele and the boy nodded. Then Damon swiftly added to the sergeant, "I'll take him with me. You'd better come as soon as you can." He drove fast, zipped back along the main street and took the side road indicated by the amazed and gratified native boy. And within ten minutes he came upon the little group of African farm hands and their white master, surrounding the buckled and overturned twoseater. For the next quarter of an hour Damon only spoke to bark an occasional order. With maniacal strength and one all-embracing oath he wrenched open the jammed door at which the men had been prising, and shoved an arm round Val's chest to lift him. Others helped. "Gently, for God's sake," he said thickly. "There's a woman underneath."

He saw her, a crumple of blue silk spattered with glass fragments, her closed eyes as dark as the bruise on her cheek in the whiteness of her face, the short red-gold hair fanned out over the split leatherette of the upholstery. He reached half his body inside the car and found her wrist. Then somehow he had an arm about her waist while the other hand held and shielded her head as he drew her up and out into the air. Her skin was cold and clammy. Someone opened the back door of his tourer and shoved a rug in position to act as a pillow. As he carefully set her down she opened her eyes and gave him a long stare of utter blankness. "It's Damon," he said softly. "I'm going to take you home." Just faintly, her lips trembled. Then her lids came down again. He stripped off his jacket and tucked it about her, flipped a coin at the piccanin and got into the car. He didn't look at Val, didn't even glance at the white farmer or at the newly-arrived Sergeant Heal. The tourer departed fairly slowly in a cloud of dust. The policeman looked uncomfortably at his companion. "The way he acted you'd think it was our fault," he said. "I suppose we ought to have found them earlier, but it's Sunday, and we're not used to this kind of thing." The other sighed. "It's a nasty business, and I suppose he feels it, seeing that he knows them both. I don't think she's badly hurt, but he'll have to break it to George Marston that his brother's dead."

George left Redlands that afternoon on a month's leave.

For a few days he would be staying in the district, but as soon as various matters affecting his brother were settled, he would take a touring holiday. Nadine and Damon were out on the road to see him go. There were brief handshakes, and Damon said: "I still think it would be best if you remained here. You need plenty to do." "I shall be all right," George answered without emotion. "To be honest, Damon, I'd feel horrible under the same roof with Lou, and it wouldn't do her any good to have me about." "Lou won't hold anything against you," Nadine put in. He seemed to gaze through her. "No, I don't think she would." Nadine added, staring straight at him, "George, I'm so sorry for what I said to you this morning. I'm terribly ashamed of having behaved like a fishwife when ..." He interrupted, still unmoved, "You spoke the truth. I didn't know you felt so strongly, but you had reason. Don't worry, Nadine. I'll get over it." "But it's so unnecessary," said Damon in a hard voice, "to insist on being alone while you do it." "It's sensible, for me. I'll be getting in touch with you. Good-bye." When his car had disappeared, Nadine turned at Damon's side and walked with him along the drive. Her usually clear brow was pleated and she gave moody attention to the flower borders they were passing.

"I suppose his going does eliminate one complication. Between us we're giving you a rotten leave, Damon." He smiled slightly. "Your own holiday hasn't been too bright. You weren't bursting with joy before this happened." "I was disappointed at being forgotten in London, but that's lost all significance. Poor Lou..." "Drop that," he said sharply. "I've told Daphne to keep away from Lou, and if you're going to soak her with pity I'll keep you away from her, too. Be gentle with her, but for Pete's sake don't pity her or she'll never live down the ghastly experience. I know you feel like hell about it — I do too - but it's over, and we who are her friends have a duty to her." "I apologize," Nadine replied wearily. Then her tone regained some of the old nonchalance. "I'll be myself tomorrow. I may even begin to enjoy the unconventional situation." "There won't be any unconventional situation. I'll sleep with the Neales and come here to breakfast. Their house is only a couple of miles a way." They came to the veranda and stopped. Nadine listened, her head tilted towards the open front door, and after a moment she lowered herself to one of the canvas chairs. Damon leaned against a post with his hands in his pockets. "George may be doing the best thing in going off alone," he said. "We were too right about Val and he's probably wincing from what might have occurred. Last time Val killed his mother." A shrug. "I'm afraid we can't help George." "What will he do about Four Winds?"

"At the moment he wants never to see the place again, but he may come round. After all, the house isn't built, and the land is as good as it ever was. If he decides to sell out, I'll buy it." "I wish you would, Damon. And demolish our shanty as soon as we're gone, so that it isn't there when he comes back." He raised a dark eyebrow. "Are you going so soon?" She nodded. "When Lou is fit to travel." "You think that's best? I don't. If you clear out right away she'll hate Rhodesia for the rest of her life because all she'll remember of it will be the last appalling incident. That wouldn't be fair to her, 'or to Rhodesia. I'm going to see that she stays for a while." "Daphne's going." "Is she?" He paused, his expression non-committal. "As far as she's concerned Africa is drained dry. She's getting bored. But Lou will need you, Nadine. We'll let it ride for a few days and then talk it over with her." Actually, Lou did not particularly need Nadine or anyone else during the next two or three days. She lay in a room furnished in golden pearwood with cherry-coloured curtains and a view between them of clipped hibiscus bushes splashed with huge scarlet trumpets. She was stiff and bruised, the dislocated shoulder ached with every movement and her head was too muzzy for coherent thinking. Every hour or so someone came in. Nadine or a servant or Damon, and more often than not she feigned sleep. Damon's approach, his hands adjusting her pillow or touching her forehead meant no more than the soft-footed entrance of Jacob with iced water. It was merely a nuisance to be endured for a minute or two. The doctor was more

of a menace because he made her sit up and submit to questioning and prodding. Straight after the doctor's visit on Wednesday, Damon came into the room. He was smiling a little. "Don't slide back into your pillows. The old chap says you can get up." For nearly four days she had spoken so little that her lips were reluctant to move. "I really don't... feel like it." "I know, but we'll make it easy for you." He opened the built-in wardrobe and slipped her dressing gown from a hanger. "Nadine's doing some packing down at Four Winds so you'll have to put up with me. Do you mind?" "No" - slowly. "I don't mind." "That's bad," he remarked conversationally. "A week ago you wouldn't have let me see you in creased pyjamas - or even in slick ones. Put your sound arm in there - I'll help this one in." When at last the thing was about her shoulders she was breathing heavily with the exertion and her face had tightened with the pain of those bruised muscles. He sat on the side of the bed, holding her for a moment. "Come on," he said then. "I'll take your weight, but you can do with the exercise." He supported her, and gripped hard when she swayed, and somehow she traversed the long distance over the thick- piled carpet to the easy chair near the window. She sat there, looking small and wan and tender, her hands lifeless upon the arms.

Damon took the hard chair the doctor had used, and got out cigarettes. "Try one?" And when she had refused, "Any objection if I do?" Apparently it would have made no difference if she had objected, for without awaiting an answer he lit up and took a long pull. Perhaps he thought the masculine aroma would be of benefit, or maybe he was merely determined to show her how very normal life was in spite of the knocks it dealt. "The more you move," he said, "the sooner the stiffness will wear off. Want some slippers?" "No, thanks." "Not curious about anything?" "You mean - about living here, at Redlands?" "That'll do for a start. How do you like it?" Speaking was still something of an effort. She said, "I haven't... though about it. Don't you find us in the way?" "No, but I may do as soon as you're walking around." He grinned. "I shall stick it for a few days, though. What do you think of the view?" She saw now that beyond the hibiscus tall palms stretched up, leaning with the south-e'ast wind, and between their thin, hairy trunks gleamed hot blue slats of sky. "The palms aren't familiar," she said. "You know them, but they look different from this angle."

There was a silence, after which Lou asked in flat tones, "Did you say Nadine is packing?" He nodded and leaned forward companionably, elbows on his knees. "A lot happened yesterday. No sooner had Daphne gone.. "Gone?" she echoed. "From Mlemba?" "Don't you remember? She came in to say good-bye to you the night before last. I arranged to have her driven in to Bulawayo and she'll take a train there for the Cape." Lou's lack-lustre eyes grew wide with the task of recollection and she gave a hesitant half-nod. It was all coming back, painfully fast but without clarity. So Daphne had departed, and Nadine was packing. "What were you saying about yesterday?" He answered tolerantly, as if she were a child, but his glance was knife-sharp. "Nadine had an offer from a struggling immigrant for all the furnishings at Four Winds. He'll be collecting the stuff tomorrow, and she has to bring the personal possessions of you both here today. She has a boy with her to load the jeep, and I expect she'll be back before tea." Despite the weariness which seemed to increase every minute, she enquired clearly, "Aren't we going to live there again?" "No one's going to live there, Louise," he replied decisively. "Four Winds has been long overdue for a dose of dynamite." A queer cold look came into his eyes, a look in which watchfulness was blended with calculation. "George isn't likely to go ahead with the house which was marked out lower down the road," he said deliberately.

But Lou had had enough. Her vision blurred with tiredness and her head lay back. She wanted to sleep. Presently he tossed his cigarette from the window, straightened the bed and got her back between the sheets. His fingers pushed away the hair which had clung with sweat to her temples, he drew the curtains to shut out the light, and went from the room.

Physically, Lou recovered quickly. By the following Sunday - just one week after the accident, she was getting up for breakfast and not going to bed till it was time for Damon to leave for his bedroom at the Neale homestead. Nadine had bought some lengths of linen and silk from the store in Mlemba, and Lou spent most of the time turning them into dresses for the two of them. Occasionally she went into the big kitchen to bake a batch of cakes, and a few times she had staked plants or uprooted the fast-growing weeds, for Damon's garden did not lack water. With Damon and Nadine she was uncommunicative. There was nothing purposeful in her avoidance of discussion about Val; she merely concluded that they knew pretty well as much as she knew herself about the events of that night. The odd thing was that the more she thought about them the cloudier they became. There was Val, all feverish, more or less ordering her to go for a drive with him, the mad rush in his car down towards Mlemba, and the halt by the roadside when they had passed Four Winds. Excitedly, furiously, the words had burst from him. She hadn't known how to deal with him; had pleaded and soothed but been unable to state the one thing he wanted to hear.

Quite what happened afterwards she was never able fully to explain. The car jerked on, took a corner at blood-freezing speed, racketed along a track and hit something which catapulted the vehicle headon into a tree-trunk. That was all. Very dimly she recalled regaining consciousness more than once in the darkness. She hadn't known Val was dead till Damon told her twenty-four hours after he had brought her to Redlands. It hadn't seemed to matter. That was her prevailing state of mind; nothing mattered. She didn't ask why she had been brought to Redlands instead of Four Winds; she knew George had gone away but did not enquire his destination. Nor was she interested in her own and Nadine's future. Perhaps it was as well that her imagination had gone dormant. Lack of it kept her very calm, and even without Damon's studiously casual references to her own connection with George and Val she would probably have been unafraid to look back. It was as if a misted glass shutter had come down between herself and the past. What she saw through it was shrouded and unreal - even to the love she had thought she had for Damon. He took her for a couple of drives, showed her a squad of Africans who were dismantling the corrugated iron walls of Four Winds and the empty hen-houses. The poultry had been transferred temporarily to Redlands ground but James still had care of them. Four Winds was disappearing, un- lamented. Then one morning, when Nadine was out with a prospective buyer for the jeep, Damon made Lou give him a game of tennis. It was hot. She played slackly and lost badly, but he only laughed and ordered long cool drinks in the veranda.

And it was while they were lounging side by side sipping iced fruit juice that he said carelessly, "You know you've changed, don't you, Lou? You don't love and hate any more. You're so listless that you don't even hate me." "You've done a great deal for me, Damon." "I'd like to do more," he answered. "I shan't be satisfied till you're full of spirit and smiling again." "It'll come, once I'm back in England." "I wonder?" He twisted his glass so that the ice tinkled, and looked into the yellow liquid speculatively. "Do you want to go home?" "I think I do." "Why?" "It's normal, isn't it? My father's there and I shall find a job. In time" - in her emotionlessness she reminded him of George - "these few months in Rhodesia will become hazy as a dream." His tone crisped, "You consider that fair to people who've grown fond of you?" "You mean George?" She let out a brief sigh. "He won't be anxious to see me again. I wish it were different, but you can't alter that kind of thing. He'd never look at me without being reminded of Val.'' "What of it?" he said brusquely. "Both you and he are strong enough to stand it for a while, and it would be bound to wear off. If I'd had my way George would have stayed here in constant contact with you. No good ever came from running away! That's why you're not going home yet."

"No?" She was only mildly surprised. "Your decision or Nadine's?" "Mine," he said briefly, and finished his drink. Lou looked at the great heavy masses of purple bougainvillea which climbed a couple of the stone posts and ran up into the thatch of the roof. The flowers had been there ever since her first visit to Redlands, and even now their colour was good, their pollen attractive to the wild bees. Flame- red poppies edged the courtyard and behind them showed the yellow suns of giant coreopsis against a line of young, scarlet-starred poinsettias. Damon's garden was always full of colour. As though he had guessed her thoughts he said, "You'll have to hang on in Rhodesia if only to see the country after it's been vitalized by rain. The roadsides are packed with cosmos and Mexican marigolds and whenever you pass a house you get the scent of roses; they grow even better here than in England. The rivers fill up and all sorts of wild tropical things grow on their banks. You see more buck, too, and an occasional giraffe lollops across the road if you go for a drive after dark. During my last leave we had to organize a leopard hunt because the farmers were losing stock." He went on talking, quietly and naturally, till Nadine drove up in the jeep. He stood up as her slim, white-clad figure came down the path. "Any luck?" he queried. She nodded, turned her smile to include Lou. "He's going to pay me what I gave for it. He'll bring the cheque and collect the jeep this evening. I feel quite dejected about it. We've liked the little bus, haven't we, Lou?" "It's best to sell it while you can get the price, though. What shall we do for transport?"

Damon was standing with his hands in his pockets, looking down at her. "You won't need any," he said. "In a day or two I'm taking you both to Bulawayo to stay with the Dennises. You can use their car." "Bulawayo?" Lou echoed, and glanced at Nadine. "You know about this?" "Damon and I have talked it over." Nadine sank into the seat he hooked forward and placed a hand over Lou's on the arm of the adjacent chair. "I agree with him that it's best for us to stay on in Rhodesia for a few weeks, and the Dennis couple seem very keen to have us. Obviously, we can't remain at Redlands. With George away, Damon needs to be on the spot, and we're keeping the poor man from his bed." "I'm ready to leave Redlands any time," said Lou. "Just like that,' said Damon a trifle unpleasantly. "I didn't mean to be hurtful." "My dear child, you don't hurt — you annoy. But let it pass. Have a cooler, Nadine. Would you like another, Louise?" "No, thank you." Settling back into her chair, Nadine looked from one to the other of them. In the ten days she and Lou had been at Redlands this was the first time he had shown irascibility with Lou's queer imperviousness. She supposed the truth of it was he couldn't wait to get his house to himself. Well, there were only two more days, she thought with an inward sigh. What a relief it would be to close the Four Winds chapter in their lives.

CHAPTER X IT was around noon when they ran in on the dusty strip road to the big modern city of Bulawayo. After the single main street of Mlemba with its couple of offshoots, the wide, macademized roads, the shops, the solid office buildings had the feel of civilization. Nadine turned from her seat beside Damon and spoke to Lou, who shared the back with some of the small luggage and their coats. "If Uncle Simon had bought a place on the edge of Bulawayo instead of Mlemba we might have farmed the land on our own account. Or you might have got fixed up in a post." "And you could have started classes in commercial art." "Heaven forbid!" said Damon. "The one thing I dislike in African cities is the mixture of extreme sophistication with the purely primitive. It's like that in the Congo, but in Malawi we're rather inaccessible and only have mountains and Lake Malawi to offer the tourist, so the few towns are small. I sometimes go as long as six months without entering a town." "How do you bear it?" exclaimed Nadine. "I could understand your clinging to the bungalow if you were married, but it sounds a grim sort of life for a bachelor." "I have to travel my district and have friends among the planters there. I've never been lonely - yet. Not many women care for the life. In fact, the wife of my assistant ran out on him a year ago and got a divorce." "Couldn't you prevent it?" "I didn't try. Once a woman has seriously considered divorce she's no further use as a wife. He's happier without her."

Nadine looked across at him sardonically. "Yet you despise him more than you despise her, don't you?" He smiled, his attention on the traffic as he swung the tourer into Selborne Avenue. "I always think," he said with sarcasm, "that the man who can't hold on to his own woman deserves whatever she does to him. On the other hand, only an utter fool would kid himself that he could take a girl from England, plant her beside him in Darkest Africa and grow roots. I've seen a good many specimens of that kind of marriage, and in those that hang together the wife has either grown apathetic, become a fiendish drinker or bridge player, engaged in many flirtations or taken up charity work among the natives. The husband has had no part at all in keeping her there." "Damon the cynic!" "Damon the wise," he amended with a shrug. "Nothing would induce me to take a wife into the wilderness. It's quick death to the finer feelings and the baser emotions grow like jungle weeds." He was only half serious, of course, but Nadine did not take the subject any further. Like Lou, she was looking out at the disappearing town and taking an interest in the suburban dwellings in their pretty sub-tropical gardens. The Dennises' house stood back from the road in three acres of garden. It was constructed of local granite blocks and had a steep roof of mottled tiles, and new climbers were starting on their way up the angular pillars which marched along each side of the straight, sandy drive. The small and lively Babs Dennis was in the porch to meet them. She wore shabby breeches and a shapeless white sweater, and had to shove aside some croquet mallets, a couple of tennis racquets and a

string bag of grass-stained balls before all of them could fit into the hall. "Jim's not due home for lunch till one," she said breezily. "Let's have a drink while we exchange news.',' She was a gay and comfortable little person. Val might never have existed, and her only allusion to George was the remark that accidentally she had seen him on his way through Bulawayo; they had only waved to each other, though. The whole atmosphere of Bain's Green was light and airy. There was much quiet laughter, friends dropping in at all times, a devotion to sport and something arranged for every evening either in the house or at the club. Babs lived chiefly on the surface of life but got great delight out of it. Her husband was the more intellectual character, but he appeared to be well satisfied with the wife he had selected. Damon drove back to Mlemba that same evening. Jim Dennis had forsaken his office for the afternoon, and the -five of them had drifted about the garden, had a swim in the small cemented pool and drank tea under a deodar which was a dull sage green with dust. A little later the women had changed and come to the veranda for sundowners, to find Damon topping up the radiator of his tourer while a boy cleaned the squashed moths and flies from the windscreen. Before the first drinks were finished darkness had fallen. Babs went indoors for a dish of snacks, Nadine bent with Jim Dennis over a book of prints which he had bought at a sale, and Lou, to her vague astonishment, found herself walking rather briskly down the drive to the road, with an inexorable hand behind her elbow.

Under a wide-spreading palm Damon stopped and looked down at her. "You know what I'm going to say, don't you, little one?" "I suppose so. I'm to have a good time and forget Four Winds." "You needn't forget Redlands." His voice lost the noncommittal note to which she had lately become accustomed. It lowered and took on depth. "You've got to wake up, Louise. Val's death isn't a big thing in your life — you'll admit that?" "Well, I..." "It can't be a big thing," he broke in almost roughly. "It was just the manner of it. You've got to realize that that was exactly the sort of end for which he was destined and it was merely filthy luck that you happened to be the woman in the case." He paused, compressed his mouth and asked with a swift change to casualness, "Do you ever think about that night in the car?" "No, but if I did, I don't think it would upset me, because I can remember so little of it." "Had he tried to kiss you during the quarrel?" She whitened and her hand came up to her throat. "Yes. Yes, he did. I'd forgotten. He ... he held on to me like a drowning man." Damon put his arm about her shaking body. His tones were still rough, but not with vexation. "It's better to remember it now than when you're alone. You were so unwise, so impatient of advice, and I'm afraid you had to pay for the unwisdom and the impatience. You'll promise not to brood over it, won't you?" She drew away from his jacket and smiled palely. "I'll get over it. Just now, I feel I don't want to be intimate with anyone - not even with Nadine."

"And men are out, I suppose." "It's natural, isn't it?" "Could be, for a short time." The harshness was easing itself out of his voice. "Don't make a habit of it, though. If ever a woman needed a man . . ." He let her guess the rest, but added, "I'll write to you and I shall expect a prompt reply. I'll see you again before I go north." "When are you going?" . "My leave is up in about five weeks, but I shall drive up there a few days before, so that I have a week or so with my relief." Teasingly he asked, "Will you be sad when we part?" Lou's fingers twisted tightly together. "I expect so - but not too sad. You make me like that." "Like what?" "You make me face facts. In this case it's the fact that people do have to part and go their ways. I ... I almost wish we were doing it now." There was a silence during which the great arms of the palm overhead rustled dryly. Then Damon said in his coolest manner, "Do you know why you wish we weren't going to see each other again? I make you dissatisfied with the sort of life you think you ought to lead. If we were saying our last good-byes now , you know you could do it unemotionally. In a week or two you'll be less sure of sustaining your poise. I believe you are waking up a little already, Louise." Lightly, he touched her hair. "It's not carrots or copper; in this light it's not even red-gold. Warm honey, rather, with streaks of moonlight and die smell of flowers." "How curious," she said. "Damon tangling himself up with moonlight and flowers."

"I was experimenting. If I'd spoken to you like that a month ago you'd either have got cross, or palpitated and changed the topic." He smiled in the darkness, and placed his hands on her shoulders. "I'm tempted to experiment further." Deliberately, he bent and kissed her mouth, kissed it hard and unerringly. When he raised his head Lou did not move, but her eyes looked up darkly into his. "That's au revoir," he said a trifle brusquely. "It'll also help to obliterate any other kisses you've tolerated. Let's go back to the house." Ten minutes later he drove away from Bulawayo. The days passed much more quickly than Lou had thought they would, chiefly because at Bain's Green there was always something happening. Babs, being a member of various committees, was for ever giving morning or afternoon tea parties, or organizing cake stalls or home-produce markets in aid of this or that charity. Her garden was the scene of a croquet tournament, her lounge occasionally turned into a sewing room and her kitchen provided the fudge and fruit candies which were sent to the children's ward at a hospital every Saturday morning by a group of local women. Withal, Babs contrived to play a good game of tennis, to swim at least once a day and to look charming in the evenings. During the daytime she wore a frock only if she were attending a function. Though continually busy, she actually did very little work herself. The five boys cooked and cleaned and looked after the large garden, and she kept them at it easily, by threatening them with dire punishments from the master. Jim was normally mild-mannered, but since he had once been seen handling a mad dog he was much

respected. Upon that incident, Babs admitted, was based her whole domestic structure. Life in Bulawayo was so different from that in Mlemba that Lou soon found herself looking back upon the past weeks as if they had happened in a drawn-out dream. She and Nadine had separate bedrooms and were seldom alone together, which perhaps was a good thing. There were no confidences between them, and very soon they were living as gaily and superficially as Babs herself. Queerly, though, Lou had an objective impression of herself as existing in a bright void between one part of her life and that which would begin as soon as she got back to England. This wasn't real; she wondered if it had reality for Nadine. They both went about with Babs and helped her to entertain in the house and garden. They danced with Jim's friends but decisively refused to make dates. They went out with the Dennises to their friends who owned farms in the neighbourhood, and at sunset they watched the tiny clouds which drifted up to blur the distant view. Steadily but very slowly those clouds would heap up and explode in a blessed relief of storms; the long winter drought would be ended. Already it was much hotter than Lou had known it in Africa. The sun burned, the veld was parched and the big, sappy plants in the borders were insatiably thirsty. The first mosquitoes came out, cicadas increased their numbers and made the nights shrill with their music. One morning, at the end of the garden, Lou found a chameleon. It was the colour of the mopani trunk to which it clung, looking like a grotesque growth till it moved to swallow a hardback. She had been watching it for some time when the sound of someone coming along the stone path brought her round to face George Marston.

She gave him a small involuntary smile, and George managed a stiff movement of his mouth in return. "Hello," he said quietly. "You're looking quite well, Lou." "I'm fine." She saw a tiredness in his face, but he was otherwise unchanged. "You're not looking too bad, either. Have you been to the house?" "I spotted you down here first." A moment's awkwardness hung between them. "My holiday is over. I'm on my way back to Redlands." She nodded, as if comprehending all he left unsaid, and walked with him along the path to the front of the house. "You'll have plenty to do as soon as the rain starts." "For the next few weeks I shall be planting citrus," he said, and the embarrassment of meeting was over. Babs, in slacks and an old shirt, was in the hall, rebinding the handle of her husband's polo stick. She accorded George an unsurprised welcome. "What ho! How far did you travel?" "I stayed in Rhodesia, fishing most of the time. Let me do that for you." He took over, and Babs called into the lounge, "Nadine, here's a man you know. Pour him a drink, will you? I'll tell Cookie to make a chop for five at lunch." Nadine said levelly, "How are you, George? Have you travelled far this morning?" and mixed him a whisky and soda. "I came across country about a hundred miles. I'll get along home after lunch."

It was all very restrained and polite. Lou didn't know that on the morning she had been found in Val's wrecked car Nadine had told George exactly what she thought of a man who gave his all to a weak brother and hauled in an innocent girl as a prop besides. She wished Nadine would be kind to him, give him a little of the sympathy he needed. "Couldn't you stay this afternoon, George?" she asked impulsively. "I might, for a short while. Damon's expecting me back. He asked me by letter to call here and find out how you were going, or I wouldn't be here." "That's not nice," she answered. "We may never see you again." He didn't look at either of them, but took a pull at the drink and ran his hand along the polo stick. "I hadn't realized you weren't going back that way," he said, but Lou gained the impression that if he had it would have made no difference. She wished, strongly, that there were time to make George feel better about everything. The next best thing was to do her utmost today. By the time George had finished his drink and had a wash, Jim Dennis was home to lunch, and afterwards, it being Saturday, he insisted on driving them all out to the Matopos, that magnificent bouldered range from which the Matabele had launched their attacks on the English and where the father of Rhodesia lies buried. They opened the picnic tea basket in a ferny cavern where lizards darted, and when the cake tins and flasks had been emptied they smoked and looked out over the extraordinary crags with thick green growth between them and at the brilliant blue sky. One could imagine those dark, lurking warriors, scarcely discernible in the millions of clefts, the glinting of thrown assegais, the tumultuous yells of victory.

Babs got up suddenly. "Who's for a climb?" Her husband joined her, but Nadine shrugged lazily. "It was enough for me to climb to this spot. I'll read one of those magazines you brought." Lou hadn't been going to climb either, but a swift glance at George altered her mind. "Take me right up to World's View, Babs," she said. "I'd like to see Rhodes' grave." For a long time after the sounds of the departing three had gone with the breeze, George lay back on his elbow, staring down at the knobbly mountainside. Nadine sat upright, slightly behind him but fairly close, the glossy magazine open across the skirt of her yellow linen dress. The daffodil yellow suited her darkness and the creamy skin; her long hand resting on the page, the nails beautifully shaped but unpolished, looked smooth and ordinary and untalented. Perhaps it was the sight of those hands, the nearest not more than eighteen inches from his eyes, which made George end the silence. "Lou seems to have got over it all right," he said. "Not too badly," she agreed evenly. "She hasn't much life yet, but the heat may have something to do with that." "It was an appalling experience for a girl. You always said she was made of sterner stuff than Val. For her sake, I'm glad." She hesitated, as if weighing the wisdom of what she was about to say. "It has affected her. She and I haven't talked much about it, but she isn't the same. Before, she was either happy or unhappy. Now, 'she seems to be on an even keel all the time - neither one thing nor the other." "It's only four weeks; she's probably still a little numb."

Her gaze rested on the top of his head; thick brown hair with grey at the temples. Her voice was low and firm. "You had by far the worst of it. We were all against your plan for the two of them - Daphne, Damon and I - and you knew it but had to struggle on. You thought you were doing the right thing, though, and we all realize that you couldn't possibly have foreseen the disaster." "That wasn't what you said - that morning." "I was mad with worry. I don't know what I said. I only know" — her tone was carefully remote - "that I've never regretted anything so much in my life as I regret all the things I said that morning." Another silence expanded between them. The breeze whispered among the rock plants, stirred the mounds of springy grass to rippling life. In all the vast natural chaos about them not a bird or beast was visible. Calmly she enquired, "What are you going to do with Four Winds? Damon says he'll buy." "I'll hang on to it for the present." "Will you go on farming the place?" "Do you," he paused, "want me to?" "It's hardly my business, is it?" "You have an opinion on most matters. I was merely asking what you thought about it." "Well" - she sounded a little strained and reluctant - "if I were you I'd go right ahead, and before Damon finishes his time in Malawi I'd build a small house on the spot you chose; it needn't be exactly as

Val planned it - he had expensive ideas. I daresay Damon will marry some time, and you'll need a home of your own." He plucked a fern frond and uncurled the tough, African tip. "If I could tell you how it all came about," he said almost inaudibly, "I would. You've never had anyone belonging to you as Val belonged to me. There's Lou, I know, but she's only your second cousin and she has independence and pride; Val hadn't much of either. I'd have spoken to you about it more if I'd thought I could have made you understand. And there was a complication - you know what I mean. I felt you'd never take to living in Rhodesia, and I'd show up as a pretty poor specimen in England." "Don't talk like that!" "It's true. I've been away too long. I was willing to use every penny for Val's future because I knew I'd never marry. It was uncanny; the very day I found I wanted to marry someone, I knew I never would." He took a long breath. "When are you going home to England f" "In two or three weeks." "Are you sorry you came?" "No. It hasn't been quite the fun I anticipated, but it's been ... instructive. I do wish I hadn't brought Lou, though." They were a foot apart and had not looked at each other since the conversation began, yet she felt him wince. Hurriedly, she went on, "You should have climbed with the others. I'm bound to hurt you, even though I don't mean to." Quite a few minutes elapsed before he muttered, "It's something that you don't mean to hurt. In your experience, has there ever been a woman who loved a man as well as having contempt for him?"

Nadine's reddened lip turned in between her teeth. Her hand moved gently to his shoulder. He turned and glanced up at her, his eyes pained, his mouth crooked. "I think we'd better go and find the other three, don't you?" he said.

After George had left that evening the Dennises gave a party to celebrate the birthday of one of their bachelor friends. It was a roaring, crazy kind of party which ended at about three in the morning, and consequently the Dennis household rose very late on Sunday morning. As soon as she had eaten a breakfast of grapefruit and toast, Lou went to a Bantu mission service which had been advertised in the press. The white people there were few, but the African congregation must have numbered nearly a thousand. The men and women stood in a semi-circle, devoutly dressed in their best, and the children squatted on the grass, large-eyed, woolly-haired youngsters, fresh as paint and happy to sing the hymns and join in the prayers which they knew astonishingly well. As soon as a hymn began they clapped the rhythm, hesitantly at first and then with quiet gusto. Their little bodies swayed with the ecstasy of their enjoyment, and Lou thought, pityingly, of bored white children in Sunday School. There were two addresses, one in Sindebele by a black priest - and how black these Rhodesians could be! - and another shorter one in English by a jolly white man who seemed to have a keen appreciation of the African's sense of humour. Lou walked back to Bain's Green with a smile on her lips. It was a dusty tramp, and it was good to see Babs lying out in a long wicker

chair on the veranda with iced water and squash on the table beside her; as usual, the tray also held several clean glasses. Babs waved a hand. "Help yourself. What energy you have, Lou! I couldn't stir this morning." "I'll bet you've had a swim." "I did laze into the water and out again, and Nadine's there now. Jim staggered off for golf." Lou poured grenadilla, topped it with ice and poked into it two straws. She sat on one of the upright grass chairs with the drink in front of her on the table, and regarded Babs' small compact figure, relaxed upon several cushions. "You thrive on parties," she said. "I couldn't stick it as you do." "You're not the type, nor is Nadine. You're both too deep. Daphne Pryce can do it - she outdid me when she was here." Babs raised herself for a draught from her glass and sank back with her hands behind her head. "By the way, why did Daphne shoot off so suddenly?" Strangely, Lou herself had never put that question. Nadine had said that Daphne had felt she was chiefly to blame for Val's precipitate actions that night, and that she was tired of Africa, anyway; an explanation which Lou accepted absolutely. "It wasn't really sudden," she said. "We'd been talking of leaving because we'd all had enough of Mlemba." "But when Jim and I were at Redlands, and afterwards, when Daphne came here, I thought she was going to marry Damon. We even talked about it one night and Damon didn't deny it. There was a lot of verbal sparring between them. Daphne said she wouldn't live

anywhere but in England, and Damon told her that was just too bad, because he was tied to Malawi and Rhodesia. I remember it particularly because after that occasion Damon was moody and he arranged to go home a day or so earlier. Jim and I decided that the argument had been serious and he was fed up because she had delivered a sort of ultimatum. He couldn't very well propose, after that." Lou pondered. She was trying to recall how Daphne and Damon had behaved the morning they arrived back from Bulawayo, when she herself had come in from taking the children to school for the last time; but as happened so often lately, the scene came back only vaguely. Lou and Damon had been enemies then. "You may have been mistaken," she said. "If Damon loved her he wouldn't let her go." "He may have had no option. He can't get out of his last couple of years in Malawi, and he couldn't keep her here against her will." She stroked her brow musingly. "Come to think of it, Damon is different now she's gone. Just as charming, of course, but he doesn't jest as much as he used to." Lou did not probe into the subject. Thinking about Damon did not fret her as it had once, 'but for some sub-conscious reason she shied away from it. Because the problem of Damon was large and at the moment not too threatening, Lou ignored it. Since he had left her here he had written twice. Both letters had been brief and conventional and she had read them through only once. The first she had answered politely, thanking him for all he had done. Dropping her reply into a mail box she had thought with a hollow mingling of gladness and fear that that was the end of Damon; after reading it he wouldn't bother with her any more. But three days ago his second note had arrived; a distant couple of

paragraphs and a final injunction to take care of herself. There was nothing to answer. When she had finished her drink Babs was dozing, so she went to her room to change into a swim suit, and made her way across the garden and through the opening in the thick frangipani hedge which screened the pool. Nadine was on the grass, drying off. She sat with her knees drawn up and one hand idly swinging her cap while she gazed over the low trees at a distant blue scribble of hills. "Hello," she said. "What was the open-air church like?" "Educational, in the best sense. Is the water warm?" "Too warm; I like it to sting." Nadine raised a critical glance. "You're thinner than when we left England. I don't know what your father's going to say." "He has Netta — he won't notice. In any case, you can't expect to fatten up in a hot country. When are we going?" "Now that Four Winds is paid for we can go any time. Do you feel horrible about leaving?" Lou dropped her robe to the grass and pulled on her cap. "A little regretful, but it hasn't been happy, has it? And somehow since ... recently, I've felt only half alive." Nadine said soberly, "I know. I suppose it's a kind of shock. You'll throw it off." She pushed up from the ground and flicked grass from her knee. "Winter will be under way when we get to England." She went off, looking moody. Lou watched her till she vanished, and she recalled George's expression of depression and resignation

as he got into the car the previous evening. Was Nadine still disgusted at his having yielded everything to his brother? Or didn't she really care for George? Somehow, Lou thought the latter, but obviously Nadine wasn't happy. Swiftly, and much more urgently than she had wanted anything during the past four weeks, Lou wanted to be sure of Nadine's happiness. But how was it possible? A sudden pulse beat in her throat; she could actually feel it without raising a finger to touch it, and it made her frightened. Alone there by the pool in its green fastness, Lou's whole being tensed with the need to make Nadine happy. She was such a dear, so thoughtful and militant for others, so silent and unapproachable about herself. For the last ten years Nadine had depended solely on herself and done it so successfully that she had inevitably drawn others to depend on her. Now, she was alone. Even Daphne, with whom she might presumably have discussed private matters, was gone. Lou, Nadine would have considered too young to be burdened with the hopes and fears of others; but at this moment Lou felt old and wise, and she asked for everything to come right for Nadine. The question was, what did Nadine Gardner most desire : domestic joy with a man, or the sophisticated and undeniably deep pleasure of working in her London flat for popular journals? If she returned to England she might conceivably have both, which was surely the best anyone could wish for Nadine. Lou dived from the side of the pool into lukewarm, brackish water and swam a few strokes mechanically. What could she do for Nadine? Nothing, seemingly, because she hadn't the ghost of a notion what Nadine really wanted from life. Nevertheless, Lou replied to Damon's letter that afternoon. She wrote the fewest possible number of words, and calculated that they

would reach him on Tuesday. He would write back at once; she was sure of it.

CHAPTER XI THE following Thursday morning Lou was alone at the pool again. Nadine had a heavy summer cold and was reading in the lounge, and Babs had gone riding with friends. Overnight there had been much thunder and lightning and a little rain. According to Jim, Bulawayo had missed the best of the storm, but the nearby farming districts had had their christening for which everyone should be grateful. Lou hadn't bathed. She lay on her robe looking up at the sky and breathing in the musky yet pungent aroma released by the rain. She was in the shadow of a m'sasa tree which towered above the frangipani, but the air circulated by the breeze over her skin was hot and unrefreshing. The atmosphere was as dry and dusty as yesterday, though the sky had lost some of its metallic heat; it was sapphire blue washed over with milk. Between her vision and the heavens a head appeared. Her heart gave an astounding leap, and she sat up with a fist pressed to her side. "Did I scare you?" said Damon. "I thought you'd have heard me." "Well, I didn't," she exclaimed sharply. "That was a beastly thing to do !" His smile hardened. "A trifle touchy, aren't you? I apologize." She was already sorry for the outburst. "I imagined myself utterly alone. You surprised me." "Unpleasantly, it seems." He got down on to the grass and looked her over, openly and appraisingly. "Have you a good colour or is that a flush of annoyance? "

She was fumbling for the sleeves of the robe, but he made no attempt to help her. Instead he slipped a cigarette case from his pocket, and while she struggled, still sitting, into the shoulders of the gown, he used his lighter. He took the cigarette from his lips and offered it. For a hesitant second she met his eyes, then she leaned her mouth forward, accepted the cigarette and at the same moment felt the accidental light brush of his fingertip upon her lips. For a moment, while he lit up for himself, she smoked furiously, after which she leaned back on her hands. "Better?" he asked quietly. She nodded. "I was stupid to let nerves get the better of me." "Have they been doing it much lately?" "This is the first time." Quickly, to gloss any implications he might gather, she added, "Have you seen Nadine?" "No, but I heard her. She was gargling in the bathroom and called out that you were down here. No one else appeared to be about.'' "Jim's working, of course, and Babs is out." Ash quivered down from her cigarette into the grass and she watched the spreading of the grey grains. "Are you in Bulawayo on business?" "On your business," he said, and quoted, " 'Dear Damon, Before you return to Malawi could you possibly arrange for Nadine to spend a few days at Redlands?' That's what you wrote, isn't it?" "Yes, but that wouldn't have brought you all this way." "It did, my sweet. What's it all about?"

"Will you do it?" she countered. "I believe I have a better idea - but tell me first what made you write that." "You'll probably think me a fool, but... well, I'm fonder of Nadine than I am of anyone..." "So?" She ignored the satirical interjection. Intent upon the grass where the ash lay scattered, she went on, "George is in love with her, but whether he could keep her here and make her happy is something I can't even guess at. I'm not asking you to do anything distasteful, Damon — only to throw them together and give whatever it is that exists between them a chance to crystallize. They hadn't long together when George called here last Saturday, and, anyway, it was the first time they'd met since ... since ..." "Since when?" he demanded mercilessly. "You know when." "Since Val smashed himself up. Why don't you show your pluck and say it!" Her voice quivered. "Because it isn't necessary. Don't bring me into this. Nadine is the important one." His eyes narrowed. "Very well. What makes you so sure that George is in love with her?" "I'm not certain, but I think he is. I suspected it a long time ago - I even told Val - but I've never been able to make up my mind about Nadine. I still can't. That's why I'd like you to arrange somehow for

them to be together at Red- lands. You might collect a house party — I expect you do give some sort of farewell binge.'' He regarded her mockingly for several seconds. Then his hand roved his chin speculatively. "Seeing that the house party is your idea, who else would you suggest as guests? Your own partner, for instance." The flush had faded completely. She was pale now, her eyelids lowered. "I've told you I'm not in this. I'll stay here with Babs." "I see," he said crisply. "Selfless devotion — at someone else's expense. You have some queer notions about me, haven't you? I can be appealed to on anyone's behalf, you can dictate how I'm to spend my last days in Rhodesia, and for yourself you'll rely on the fact that I'm a man who pities you for the bad hours you had one night. It's about time you realized that I don't pity you at all. To be candid, I no longer feel an imperative urge to do much for you, either." She cast him a hurried glance of hurt and unbelief. His jaw was angular, his mouth thin. She had the prickly sensation of let-down and loss. "Then why did you come?" she queried, low-voiced. "You're only a couple of hours from Mlemba and I had nothing else to do today," he returned curtly. "But you said you had a better idea than mine — as if you'd been thinking over my letter." "Oh, hell!" he said in anger and exasperation, and lay back flat in the grass. Lou looked away over the pool. Down the centre the rectangle of water was all blue sky, and on each side billowed the foreshortened

trees. Leaves and petals floated, and a bird which knew the pool dipped low, incorrigibly curious about that other bird which, at this particular spot, always winged along underneath him. Damon lying here beside her made her uneasy and afraid. There was no real reason for him to come here; he could have answered her by post or even have communicated direct with Nadine. She had been so startled by his appearing with such suddenness that she could not have said now whether she had been pleased or sorry to see him. She only knew that life without Damon was untroubled, and his nearness suffocating and ominous. He made her uncertain and wary, made her aware that she was capable of rousing in him an emotion akin to hate. Damon far away at Redlands was the kind of friend of whom one could demand almost anything. That was the mistake she had made. -' "Have you been having high times?" he asked abruptly. "You know Babs," she replied evenly. "Broken any hearts?" "They grow them tough in Rhodesia." Without turning, she knew he was impatiently jabbing his cigarette into the earth. His brows would be drawn into a straight line, his mouth dented hard at the corners. "Harking back to the object of my being here," he said, "the better idea happened to come to me before I had your letter. Care to hear about it? " "Yes, please," she answered meekly.

"Let me put a question first. Do you still like Africa?" "It's a strange and wonderful country. In spite of everything, I'll always be glad I came." "You haven't left us yet," he told her, an ironical twist to the smile that she could hear, but not see. "How would you like to make a tour on your way to the coast?" "A tour?" Her head turned. "What has this to do with..." "I'm coming to that." He shifted to his side and leant on an elbow. "This is my plan - and remember that it wasn't inspired by your letter. We could leave - the four of us - next Monday or Tuesday, and travel first to the Victoria Falls. Nadine used to say she'd hate to go home without seeing them, and I'm sure you'd enjoy the trip everyone does. From there we'd drive across Rhodesia to Malawi." "Malawi!" His tone was aloof and sarcastic. "Didn't you think the place really existed except on the map?" "Don't jump on me, Damon I It's simply that I've never for a moment thought I'd go there. You mean that George will go, too?" "All the way. He keeps an eye on the Neales' place while they take a holiday, and they'll do the same at Redlands for a week or so." "But will he agree?" "I can persuade him. If he does care for Nadine he won't need much persuasion. We'll take about four days over the trip and it'll be pot luck at night - a hotel if we can reach one, a bed under the stars if we can't. There's not much risk of rain yet - not heavy rain, anyway."

She gazed down at him, perplexed and unwillingly excited. "You're going back to your job, but what will we others do in Malawi? " He reached out to the hand which was spread flat on the grass to support her weight, and deliberately crossed the middle finger over the forefinger. "Leave it like that. If by then George and Nadine are still willing to part, he and I will put you on the train at Blantyre for Beira, or he can take you through by road; it's only about three hours to the coast." Lou, still staring at him, saw the stony mockery in his face and was instantly conscious of the old antagonism bristling between them. In a dry little voice she asked, "What made you think that this was a good plan - before receiving my letter?" "I've had enough inaction," he responded carelessly, "and I didn't fancy the long journey alone. Does it appeal to you?" "I don't mind - if George will be there." "Good old George," he commented laconically. "Pity it isn't you he wants to marry, isn't it? He'd make you a wonderfully comfortable husband." She let a long moment pass by before enquiring, in those same dry tones, "If you dislike me so much, why do you do things for me?" "I like to turn wrongs into rights. I've been trained that way. And I don't really dislike you, Louise. If I did, I wouldn't contemplate going to the trouble of showing you a few sights to remember in the long years to come." Lightly, almost on a teasing note, he added, "You're coming round nicely, my pet. Last time I saw you you didn't care whether I liked you or not. You didn't even feel it when I kissed you. I wonder ..." She pulled the robe collar tight about her throat and drew away hastily, and he gave

an edged laugh. "Don't agitate yourself. I'm not in experimental mood. This morning I'd rather beat you than kiss you." He got up and held out a hand. "Come with me to find Nadine." She used the hand but at once let it go. "I haven't had my swim yet." "I've some trunks in the car. If you'll wait a bit I'll swim with you." She shook her head. "Go in and speak to Nadine before Babs comes back. I'll have a dip and join you." He shrugged coolly and turned away. "So be it. Don't drown yourself."

By the time Lou had had her bathe and changed into a dress, Babs was home and reclining, in disreputable breeches, upon a divan in the lounge. Perhaps the secret of her vitality was the faculty of relaxation between bursts of energy. Apparently she had walked in on the discussion between Damon and Nadine and they had drawn her into it, for as Lou entered the room, Babs was saying, "You must agree to it, Nadine. From here it's a long way to the coast, whichever direction you choose, and you've already done the trip up from Durban. Damon's suggestion will take you into northern Rhodesia — which is quite different from Southern - then into Malawi and eventually through Mozambique to Beira. You can't pass up a chance of seeing Central Africa." Nadine was not enthusiastic. "A long-drawn farewell," she said. "We don't want it - do we, Lou?" "Lou's already agreed," Damon put in. "Neither of us imagined for a second that you wouldn't." He grinned, watchfully. "Scared of being a defenceless woman at the mercy of two big men? "

"Defenceless, nothing," she replied hardily. "If Lou is willing, I suppose I'd better be, too. But I warn you I'm not cut out for the road. The distances in this country are too great, and by the time we say goodbye we'll all detest each other." "Let's take a chance," he said. "You'll feel differently when you've thrown off that cold." He had a meal with them but left directly afterwards. His car had to be greased and overhauled in readiness for the long journey, and he had to buy some kit and canned rations. He got into the tourer and bade them a casual goodbye. "You can expect us to breakfast at seven on Tuesday, Babs - we'll leave Mlemba around five. And you other two had better be absolutely ready. Bring some aspirin and travel sickness tablets, and pack your toilet things and pyjamas in a separate bag. We shan't be able to unload every night." He stepped on the accelerator, and Nadine, after following his departure with a glance, shook her head at Lou with rueful scepticism. "Heaven alone knows what we've let ourselves in for. If there's anything I loathe it's the precarious, camping type of existence, and there are times when men can be a horrible embarrassment.'' "Not those two — they're both considerate." Lou didn't say what she was thinking - that she was beginning to look forward to reaching the coast and boarding a ship for England. There was plenty to do during the next four days. Even though they had had little to spend while at Mlemba, quite a few articles had accumulated with which they were reluctant to part. And the bed linen and napery were as bulky as several frocks and sweaters. The

three blankets were sent to a mission; they were too thin for England and of a cheap grade besides. Uncle Simon's books, for which Nadine had contracted an inexplicable antipathy, were to be given to the local library. "I expect the old chap would be scandalized at what I've done with his legacy," Nadine remarked broodingly. "At Four Winds I was supposed to discover my latest genius, instead of which I lost whatever talent I had. It just wasn't my environment." "It might have been, in other circumstances," argued Lou. "It's odd how one can live isolated from the crowd and not find peace. Your uncle must have had peace within him. You should have come to Rhodesia alone, Nadine." She smiled sadly. "I'd have starved to death." "There's always tinned beans, and you might have done some good work. If you hadn't had Daphne as a model you'd have had to look for someone else, and that alone would have lifted you out of the groove.'' Nadine looked at her curiously. "Do you realize that you've put your finger dead on the spot, Lou? I was in a groove, in more ways than one. In my work I found that I could sell Daphne in furs and Daphne in summer silks with a tweedy swain, and because I aspired to nothing better than a cosy modern flat and a few friends I was comparatively happy. At Four Winds there were so many conflicting happenings that I had the deuce of a job even to finish the commissions, and when I'd seen the last of them I hadn't the urge to do more. What I shall do when I go home, I don't know. I certainly shan't sketch any more Daphnes." "You have your money, so you can look around."

After this talk, Lou felt slightly sick and dispirited. That Nadine intended going home to England was definite; and what she had said about a long-drawn farewell was the simple truth. The tour of the Falls and northern Rhodesia would be cruel to three of them; yes, three of them, because something inside her 'shrank from the enforced intimacy with Damon, and if she were going to suffer it for nothing... Quite violently, she found she had no wish to see Damon again; it was the old, recurring wish, but much stronger. Just by being near he shook her up, compelled her to think back and back to the time long ago when she had fancied he had everything she could ever love in a man. Futile reflections kept her awake at night, and when she did drift into a restless sleep she dreamed, starkly, of tearing along in a car on a dark rutted road, and smashing with terrible force into a tree. During the day, while she washed or ironed or packed and fastened a trunk, she was able objectively to analyse Nadine and Daphne; not their emotions, of which she could know little, but their reactions to the succession of small incidents at Four Winds. Nadine was just and tolerant; one couldn't visualize her behaving out of character. Even when she drooped she was still Nadine. Daphne didn't deviate from her own set of rules, either. She was superficial and joy-seeking, she couldn't get along without a man in tow and she measured almost everything in terms of the pound sterling. But in her, too, there was a streak of justice and loyalty towards women, at any rate. It had taken Daphne's bluntness, the inflexible quality in her which was opposed to any woman being the tool of a man, to show Val his own worth.

Lou thought queerly that Daphne had sent Val to his death. Handle gently, as Lou would have done it, he would probably still be here, pleading for his own vapid life. Poor Val. Daphne hadn't been upset about Val's end; her remorse had been solely for what she had done to Lou, and she was over that now. In a letter to Nadine from Cape Town on the eve of sailing, she had written: "I cabled Tony and got a reply. He'll meet me with the gang at Southampton. By the time you turn up in England I may be Mrs. Cottrell." Lou would have liked to know whether Nadine had told Damon that last bit. Whatever Babs might say to the contrary, Damon was heartwhole; Lou was sure of it. But he must have weakened a little towards Daphne. Had she got the kisses she had set out to capture? They knew the game so well, she and Damon. Fretting over unalterable things much more than she realized, Lou lost most of the appetite she had regained, and the last vestige of natural pink in her cheeks. The tan made her sallow, sleeplessness darkened her eyes, and the effort to be jolly with the Dennises' friends caused her a perpetual headache. Their last night at Bain's Green was made the excuse for a midnight party in the garden and down at the pool. Jim had demurred. "Not a midnight party, Babs. The poor girls have to be up at six in the morning." But Babs had rejoined airily, "Gosh, what does it matter? They can snooze in the car all the morning on the way north." So a midnight party it was. Hurricane lanterns lit the path down the garden to the pool and the gramophone was set going in the veranda. Food trolleys seemed to be everywhere, and the racy crowd moved

back and forth, their talk and laughter loud and not particularly attractive. Lou's gratitude for her stay with Jim and Babs Dennis was unbounded, but that night, willing herself to be bright in spite of a throbbing head, she felt she had had about as much as she could endure of Bain's Green. Though it had not rained again, clouds were re-grouping and the air had become humid. Everyone perspired and groused amiably about it. Dancing brought out the sweat in a film over the whole body and the breeze had the sticky feel of a moving blanket of wet mist. Gone, it seemed, were the clear sparkling nights, the dry zephyr which rattled the palms and whispered through the tall grasses. When at last the guests had departed, Lou lay limply in her bed, hoping for sleep. When she did lose consciousness the pink dawn was rising, and in no time at all she was awakened by the boy with morning coffee. "Six o'clock, mussus," be said thickly, expressionlessly. "Bath ready." She swallowed some of the coffee and swayed from her bed to the window. Over the garden the litter of last night's festivity lay strewn. Ice cream dishes, chocolate wrappings, cups and glasses, a pile of sandwich plates, drinking straws. In the pearly light, the scene looked tawdry, a desecration, but already two of the boys were clearing up, draining half- empty glasses and pouncing upon a dropped candy or sweet biscuit. Lou had her bath and put on black linen slacks and a thin white blouse. She got a boy to marshal the trunks and suitcases on the front porch and then she went into the dining room to find Nadine,

looking slightly more cheerful than of late, drinking orange juice and ordering a poached egg on dry toast. "Got a hangover?" asked Nadine. "A horror. Haven't you? " "Not too bad. I didn't exert myself last night and I took a sleeping pill. I'm not sorry to be putting this part of Africa behind me." Lou slackly sipped her juice. "Wouldn't it be a relief," she said, "if we were going to hop a plane and find ourselves in England in a couple of days?" "If that's how you feel you needn't have agreed to chase across Africa with those two men. There's one thing about this venture - it's the end. So cheer up, darling, you're leaving the worst behind." The boy brought Nadine's egg and he also placed one in front of Lou. She eyed it with distaste and pushed it aside. A car door slammed and she braced herself. Damon came straight in, lithe and tall and tanned, his cool smile resting on them both. He was in a white shirt and khaki shorts, and his thick dark hair was ruffled with the breeze with which speed had filled the car. "Good morning, ladies! May I join you?" "Sit there," said Nadine, indicating the seat to the right of the table. "Where's your companion?" "He'll be here soon. We stopped at a garage to get a fill- up and I got away first." Lou looked at him. "Have you ... did you come in two cars?"

"Did you think that all of us - and the luggage - were going to squash into one? The only vacant spot in my car is the seat beside me; the rest is taken up by my gear — I'm moving house, remember, and going back to work. In any case, George will need a car to get him back to Mlemba." "It seems an awful lot of trouble - for George, I mean." He leaned forward, his eyes sharp and calculating. "What's the matter with you - cold feet? You look terrible this morning — as if someone had ironed you out. And your eyes are like holes poked into a sheet." "When I can't get along without your opinion I'll ask for it!" "It strikes me that you are asking for it." He tipped the edge of the plate on which her egg was congealing. "Is this yours? Well, see that you eat it. We're going three hundred miles and if you start out empty, by lunch time you'll feel like death." Nadine intervened, "Leave her alone, Damon. We had a party last night and she didn't sleep." Lou was saved whatever Damon was about to retort by the arrival of George. He stood in the doorway, smiling in a rugged, guarded way. Even in her present depleted condition, Lou swiftly watched for Nadine's reaction, and was baffled. George said, "Good morning, Nadine. Good morning, Lou," and seated himself in the only vacant chair at the table. Nadine inclined a cool, poised head. "Do you men want orange juice or only coffee? Ah, here's the boy with your bacon and eggs."

Now that the sun was well up it was really an exquisite morning. The warm wash of sunshine beyond the open french window was caught up in the yellow of the small bowl of flowers on the table and again in the dish of bananas and oranges. There was a glint of gold, too, where a thin shaft piercing the room picked out the lights in Lou's hair. The men ate with infuriating heartiness and each drank two cups of coffee. Just as they had finished Babs appeared, unashamedly straight from her bed; her feet were bare, her wrap dragged on anyhow and tightly girdled. Jim was up and dressed and ready for his breakfast. George got a boy to help him stow the luggage into his car, and Damon said he would get away now. He shook hands with Jim, benignly patted Babs' sleepy head and looked round for his passenger. "I'll go with you on the first lap," Nadine mentioned calmly. "Lou knows more about our luggage than I do and she'll see that nothing is left behind." "Suits me," said Damon. "See you later, George. We'll stop at exactly twelve for some lunch." George nodded. "Right, we'll catch you up then." Lou saw the tourer set off. She felt sharp longing that was pain, and turned back to make a final unnecessary survey of her own room and Nadine's. George's slow and purposeful stacking of the bags rasped her. When she said that surely everything was ready now, he smiled at her fraternally. "These aren't English roads, you know. Beyond the Zambesi there are some bad patches. The cases have to be wedged so that they'll

stay put if we hit a pothole at speed. I think we're about set now, though." She said her good-byes and thanks, and promised to write to Babs. George said he would drop in some time for a long weekend, and the car slid down that straight drive with the rough stone pillars on each side, and out on to the road. Lou drew a long, unhappy sigh. Good-bye, Bulawayo.

CHAPTER XII THE road from Bulawayo to the Falls is for the most part extremely good. Its chief fault lies in the monotony of savanna and bush on either side and the few signs of civilization. For more than two hundred miles there are no breathtaking vistas, no gurgling rivers or craggy peaks; it is seldom, even, that a native hut relieves the barely undulating countryside. Lou did see notices bidding the traveller beware of elephants. She also saw flattened young trees which probably meant that the king of the forest had passed that way, but the only beast to enliven the journey was a meerkat which crossed the road almost under the wheels of the car. Occasionally they passed another car or met an oncoming one. There would be an isolated filling station with a native store alongside, a solitary little tea room in the wilderness, and then eighty or more miles to the next oasis. At one place where they stopped for petrol a black boy was seated at an ancient treadle sewing machine in the stoep of the store. Beside him sat another boy wearing only a shirt; his trousers were being patched for a small fee by the village machinist. At Halfway House they stopped at the tiny hotel for a drink. George ordered lager, and Lou was astonished and grateful as the mildly bitter liquid, ice-cold, slipped past her burning throat. It was nearly half-past twelve before they spied Damon's car pulled up in the shade of the only group of gums in many miles. Lou got out and stretched her cramped legs. She stood watching Damon peel an apple and quarter it. "Want a piece?" He put it into her hand. "We've eaten, but the big flask leaked. Can you spare us a cup of tea?"

George opened his picnic case and got down beside it. He filled the cup Nadine held out and dropped into the tea a spoonful of sugar. She thanked him, sipped and looked about her impersonally. "Did you find it hot driving?" Damon asked companionably. George's shoulders lifted. "So-so. It'll be hotter as we go north." Damon put the flat of his hand to Lou's back. "You're wet through. Didn't you have the sense to wear a woollen vest?" "No, I didn't," she said crossly. "I don't own such a thing." "You'll be able to buy a couple in Livingstone. Can't have you breaking out in blisters." Lou sat down and tugged the lid from a tin of sandwiches. She would have liked to hurl the lot straight at Damon's head. Instead, though, she took one and pushed the tin across to George. The men discussed the technicalities of driving in the midday sun, filled up the radiators from bottles they had brought with them and tested the tyres with a gauge. Heat shimmered around both vehicles, but neither of the men appeared to mind being near them in the scorching sunshine. Nadine, smoking a cigarette at Lou's side, remarked that while driving the time had passed more quickly than she had expected. "How did you get along with George?" she wanted to know. "Not too badly. He explains everything." "Do you think he's recovering from that business with Val?" "I suppose he's still hurt inside. He didn't speak about it, and he seems to be superficially contented."

"Damon says that Val's death was the kindest thing that could have happened to George." "Damon would say that. He has about as much heart as that big car of his." "Damon's all right," said Nadine generously. "You seem to think he's immune from the normal problems, but he has his bad moments, like most of us." Lou regarded his tall figure sceptically. "What can he know about ordinary people? He's never been really unhappy in his life. All he cares about his Redlands and the territory of which he's district commissioner. He wouldn't let you see it, but he's probably seething with joy at the prospect of returning to the jungle." "As a matter of fact," remarked Nadine, "he's very much on edge — for Damon, that is. I keep wondering whether Daphne did get under his skin, after all." From pain, Lou said, "I hope so - and I hope it will take him a long time to get over it." "How grimly vindictive." Nadine gave her a sideways glance. "It's only about an hour and a half to the Falls. Would you like to continue with George?" "Yes, please. You can have the whole day with him tomorrow." But Lou's heart sank as she said it. She knew, infallibly, that her own plan - that Nadine should spend some days at Redlands - would have been far safer and much less harrowing than this tour of Central Africa with the two men. For long minutes she felt she could not go on with it; it demanded too much - the effort of surface agreeableness, the tension and anguish underneath.

Then the men came over. "Shall we start off again?" asked Damon. "We won't lose each other this time, and if there's a particularly good view we'll all stop." An hour or so later they got their first glimpse of "the smoke that thunders". It rose in a dense white cloud from a massive bed of greenery, and then as the road sloped the scene was lost in the lushness of tropical vegetation. It was early afternoon when they passed the police office and the vast hotels and ran alongside the Rain Forest. George halted his car behind Damon's, and the moment the engine ceased its noise Lou heard in all its deafening impressive- ness the gigantic roar of the largest and most beautiful falls in the world. The vapour was unbelievable in its extent and density. It seemed to stretch for miles behind and in front of them, and within seconds the car windows were streaming. Damon and Nadine were outside, enveloped in raincoats. George reached into the back of the car for his own and Lou's waterproofs. Lou said anxiously, "Nadine's had a cold. Do you think this kind of wetness is harmful?" "It could be. If we go on out of the Rain Forest we can see plenty without getting wet." He slipped from behind the wheel, pulling on his coat, and Lou got out on the other side into a wonderfully cool, enveloping spray. Damon was saying, "The best views are from the other side of the Rain Forest. We'll have to walk over to the edge of the gorge. It's soggy, but-worth it." "Ought Nadine to go if she's had a cold?" put in George.

Damon appraised her critically. "Maybe not. I'll take Lou, and we'll meet you at the Livingstone statue." The Victoria Falls, Lou at once admitted, are one of those sights which have to be seen to be believed. Standing close to the edge of the Rain Forest with Damon, she gazed upon the stupendous magnificence of vista after vista of cascading white waters and wondered how Livingstone had felt when he had first witnessed that spilling of the great Zambesi into those incredibly deep fissures. It was the same today as it had been a thousand years ago - a thousand years! Dozens of green islands swept by turbulent waters, a mile or more of incredible chasms, millions of tons of water pouring over those rocky ledges every minute. Damon emitted a masterpiece of understatement. "Not bad, is it?" For some reason her throat was as raw as if she had swallowed rock salt. "Oh, Damon," was all she said with a shaky laugh, and he laughed back and tucked her closer to his side. They walked along the rim of the gorge, rain pelting on them from the trees and palms, and presently they came out into dazzling sunshine, Damon's arm dropped from her shoulder and the magic diminished. There were other falls to visit and baboons to feed; the four of them had tea at the Boat-House, and took a long walk among the date and Mulala palms. "The Mulalas grow a nut which is used as vegetable ivory," Damon said. "They make the mementoes you buy at the curio shops from it. Do you girls want any native oddments?"

"Need we buy them today? Are we going straight on in the morning?" queried Nadine. "Not necessarily. If you like we can take the launch up to Kandahar Island. I think we'll book a couple of rest huts for tonight. If we stay at the hotel it will mean getting out suits and your frocks, and I'm sure you're too weary to go to that trouble. Agreed? " The rest huts had it. Damon chose two square white ones with thatched roofs and a thick tropical acacia between them. He bribed a boy to bring a tin tub and can of hot water to each hut, and when darkness had fallen the same boy built a fire outside and cooked half a dozen steaks and a panful of roughly-chopped potatoes which tasted extraordinarily good. That night, among the trees and with the inescapable roar of the Falls about them, was one of the loveliest and bitterest Lou had ever known. After the day of travelling and walking, of heat and strangeness, the two women were too tired to do more than lounge, wordless, in' canvas chairs, while the men talked desultorily of their plans for the next couple of days. And Lou thought, "This will never happen to me again, this night full of peace, in Africa, with Damon." At ten o'clock he looked at his watch. "Bedtime, children," he said. "Be sure to put out the lamp and draw the mosquito nets before you sleep." The two women went into their one-roomed hut with its twin beds and the strip of coco-matting on the floor. And as they lay in the darkness they heard the men exchange a little more conversation before moving off to their own sleeping quarters. Then came only the ceaseless falling of tremendous waters.

Lou slept well that night, and when she awakened, around six-thirty, it seemed that the roar of the Falls had changed to a queer kind of music. She gazed through the single, wire-screened window and saw the bright little birds which trilled in the acacia, weavers constructing their upside- down nests and holding shrill converse while they did so. She washed in lukewarm water, put on the black slacks and a fresh, pale green blouse and combed her hair. Nadine was stretching and dragging back her mosquito net. "Hello, Lou. D'you suppose we get early coffee?" "I'll go and see. I believe it's marvellous outside." Lou turned the key and stepped out into the morning sun. Boys were stirring, going round with cans of hot water and lighting the fires. Lou stood back and looked up at those ingenious nests of woven grass in the heavily green acacia. "Did they waken you?" asked Damon at her back. She turned swiftly, and because it was morning and this was Damon, clean-shaven and tolerantly smiling, she was all youth and eagerness. "Aren't the birds pretty !" she exclaimed. "Not only the birds," he said. "No need to ask if you slept well." She looked at him properly then, saw that though the smile was amused there was no amusement in his eyes. "Damon..." "Yes?"

"Will you . . can't we ..." Hot colour came into her cheeks and she stopped. "I expect I will, and I daresay we can," he said very steadily. "What is it?" Lou wasn't sure what she had been going to say. She was only aware that this was a heavenly morning and that she wanted terribly not to be enemies with Damon for the last two or three days she would spend in Africa. But George came out of the next hut and wished her good morning, and Damon got down on his haunches by the brick fireplace and made the flames leap. So there was nothing for it but to get on with unfolding the table and preparing it for breakfast. George made the coffee and Lou poured it and took a cup to Nadine. The boy brought slices of fish which were set to sizzle, and Damon got some fruit from the car. This morning, Nadine's shirt was scarlet and her hair, because it had not had its usual overnight attention, waved more softly back from her brow. She looked languid but rather sweet, Lou thought, and she was not surprised when Nadine voted for a quiet morning here in the shade. "I had enough tramping round waterfalls yesterday," she said. "You three take the launch trip and leave me here. I'll read a bit, and wander over to the curio vendors. What time are we starting away?" "Not later than one-thirty," Damon said. "We'll sleep at Lusaka tonight." "I'll get the boy to fix a lunch at twelve-fifteen. Will you be back by then?"

"Easily, but I think one of us ought to stay with you." George took his pipe from his pocket, looked into the bowl and decided to have a cigarette. "I'm staying," he observed. "The ventwindow of the car stuck yesterday and I want to see what's wrong with it." Disappointed, Lou said, "And you've done the islands, Damon. You're not really keen to go." "I believe I am, though," he answered. "Last time I went up the Zambesi it was in a canoe with native paddlers. I'll see it again, with the delighted surprise of a little girl. Let's get moving, Baby Lou." "I won't go at all, if you call me that!" "Oh, yes, you will. You know very well you feel far safer when I treat you as a child." George gave a brief laugh, and Nadine smiled. "Give in to him, Lou. This time next week we'll have parted from these overlords for ever." There was a short silence. Then Damon went into the hut for his binoculars and strode over to where the cars were parked under the trees. He saw Lou seated beside him, started up and backed out on to the rough path. There was nothing for Nadine to do. The boy washed the breakfast things and stripped the beds, he swept out the huts and gratefully accepted the remains of a cake they had bought at the tea house, then plodded away to do other duties. At this riffle of the year the visitors to the Falls were few. It was grillingly hot and the rains were imminent. Nadine could imagine how unpleasant it would be here among the tropical trees in torrential rain.

She sat with her hands crossed behind her head on the wooden bar of the canvas chair, and watched George unscrewing the knob which worked the vent window near the driving wheel of his car. His fingers were big, but not clumsy, and he was very careful to place the washers, or whatever they were, where he would quickly find them again. He extracted a duster from the glove box, pushed a pencil into a wad of it and cleaned out the groove into which the window fitted. A small oil can came into use, the window was pushed in and out a few times and the screws and washers put back where they belonged. He came over, rubbing the grease from his hands with the duster, and smiled down at Nadine. "You look beautifully relaxed. Would you like a cool drink?" "Would I! Where's the ice coming from?" "Leave it to me. Give me a minute to scrub my hands and I'll get it for you." She waited, with her eyes closed. She remembered hearing that people who lived in a hot country always have to go back, and sitting there, with the trees soughing in the hot breeze and the noise of the Falls narcotic in its insistence, Nadine could believe it. It was hard to leave this part of Africa, impossible to do so cheerfully. George was only gone a short while, and he returned carrying on a tin tray the ingredients of several refreshing drinks. "Don't move," he bade her. "I'll fix them." He placed the tray on one stool and pulled near another, to sit on. "The sun's on your head," said Nadine. "I'm accustomed to it. It doesn't bother me."

"It bothers me to see it. Come this way a foot and you'll be in the shade." He complied, and gave her a glass. Her hand shrank deliciously from its coldness and she drank thirstily. "Will it be hot up the river?" she asked. "Fairly. They don't go fast. It won't be unbearable, though, and Damon will see that Lou doesn't overdo it. He may be too masterful in his methods, but he gets results." She hesitated, and enquired bluntly, "What's wrong with Damon?" "Wrong?" George looked at the slender arcs of her black eyebrows drawn into a frown. "Nothing at all, as far as I know. There's always a vaguely unsettling feeling at the end of a long leave, and possibly it makes him irritable sometimes. I used to get fed up with the last couple of weeks of freedom myself." "No, it's something else." She stirred thoughtfully with a straw at the remnants of ice in her glass. "When we drove up from Bulawayo yesterday he hardly talked at all. He drove like a demon and seemed to be all wires." "That doesn't mean a thing," George reassured her. "He just doesn't happen to be the prosaic type. I can moon along at fifty and enjoy it, but Damon always has to get anywhere as fast as possible." "Haven't you seen any difference in him lately?" "Yes, I have." He paused and added slowly, "I'm afraid Val ruined his leave - as he wrecked your stay at Four Winds." "It can't be undone," she said quickly. "Forget it."

George was sitting lower than she, and half facing her, but he turned slightly away from her as he answered, "Some things have to be said, Nadine. I may be a pretty dull chap compared with those you knew in London, but I'm not by any means insensitive. Something did start growing between us before I offered to buy Four Winds for Val, and as far as I'm concerned, it's still there." Her voice when she replied was so low that only anyone who was close and unwilling to hear anything else could have distinguished the words. "It doesn't do any good to live it all over again. You gladly let everything go so that Val should have what he wanted. You so impoverished yourself that you had nothing to ... offer anyone. I can't see that Val's death makes any fundamental difference." "That's the way I thought when I saw you in Bulawayo on my way back from the month's leave. During that month I believe I sank as low in my own esteem as any man can sink." "Please, George! I'd rather not hear it." He said doggedly, "You're going to hear it. You can't put yourself in my place because you've never had a younger brother or sister depending on you for cash and courage, but you're big-hearted enough to try. The one thing I couldn't give Val was character - that was where I slipped up — in thinking that a wife and a farm of his own would develop one. He'd relied on me since boyhood, and his mother thought him perfect. He'd have gone to pieces after she died if I hadn't brought him out here. And then, once I'd made him cut himself adrift from the life he knew, I had no option but to go on with it." "You should have forced him to stand alone."

Meeting her eyes he asked, "Would you have forced Lou to stand alone after the smash?" "It isn't the same." "Quite. It isn't the same, because Lou has strength and spirit, and none of it was her fault; she'd nothing to reproach herself with. Through negligent driving, Val killed his mother, and he was loaded down with self-blame." Nadine quelled a pitying sigh. "I do realize you were in a spot and Val had to come first. But you'd have found another way if... well, if you'd valued your friends." "You were anything but encouraging, and I hadn't known anyone like you before." He leaned forward, his hand on the narrow wooden arm of her chair. "We seldom met without your mentioning that you couldn't settle in Rhodesia. There was also the ingrained antipathy, through that fellow you knew before, to marriage." He broke off, took the glass from her and held her hand, cold in the palm and hot at the back, in both of his. "Yes, marriage, Nadine. We'll have to face it. Not yet, perhaps, but we can't leave it long." "Oh, shut up," she said vexedly, and dragged away her hand. "I've had enough for one morning. I'm going to the shop." He gave his brief laugh, but the tone of it was lighter. "All right. I'll go with you." They bought a few oddments: a carved crocodile, ivory cocktail sticks, a tiny string of elephants, and a mvule wood tobacco bowl for George. And because it would be a pity to leave this mysterious heart of Africa without one last reflection upon its stupendous beauty, they strolled round to get a good view of the Eastern Cataract in golden sunshine, with all those other teeming ledges in the background.

Back at the rest huts they found the boy preparing an unappetizing mess of tinned corn and sausages. "Heavens," said Nadine. "I'm not that hungry. Are you?" "The lad's doing his best, but I think we'd better go over to the hotel for lunch." "It's a quarter to one. Lou and Damon are late." "It won't be a catastrophe if we don't get as far as Lusaka tonight." "Is there any reason why they should be as late as this?" "Maybe they're walking round for a last feast, as we did. Ah, you can stop worrying. Here they are." The tourer slid into its former position, Damon got out and so did Lou. As they came across the grass, Nadine's smiling rebuke was checked before she could utter it. Damon's expression was set, his mouth thin. Lou was untidy, and a rent showed at the shoulder of the green blouse. Her cheeks were scarlet and the grey eyes were bright with an acute unhappiness. Whether George noticed anything Nadine could not tell. Apparently having forgotten his suggestion that they eat at the hotel, he spoke in his ordinary, comradely way. "Don't look at this stuff in the pan. I'll go over and get some new rolls and tomatoes, and open a tin of cheese. It'll be ready by the time you two have cleaned up." Nadine, who loathed tinkering with a fire of any sort, found herself abetting him. "I'll make some tea. Go. on, Lou — freshen up. You can tell us your adventures later."

As she put the kettle to boil Nadine sighed. Men, she thought witheringly. George, trying to make her stay in Africa. Damon, hurt over Daphne and taking it out on Lou. Bless you, Uncle Simon; you ought to be made to clear up this hash! Lou was much paler and entirely composed when she reappeared. She had changed the shirt, brushed her hair and carefully made up her face. To Nadine's enquiries, while they were all at the table, Damon returned a terse explanation. "The jaunt up to Kandahar went according to schedule. As we were walking back to the car we were besieged by monkeys. It was towards the North Bank but near the vapour, and close to a sharp slope into one of the gorges. A monkey jumped on Lou and she stepped back. I grabbed her. That's all." Nadine took a shrewd guess at what the bald details covered. Lou laughing at the friendly monkeys, as everyone did. Damon impatiently telling her to come away from the things; it was getting late. The importunate little animal springing so swiftly to her shoulder that instinctively and without thought she backed, to be gripped and yanked forward with considerable force, and cursed in the way Damon doubtless could curse when he was furious. The outing completely spoiled. "Thank the stars it was nothing more serious," she stated in her most casual manner. "There seem to be numerous danger spots, and when you didn't turn up I began to be anxious. I'm glad I didn't stay here alone. I'd have been frantic." She raised her head and caught George's glance, which told her, half-humorously, that he also was glad she hadn't stayed here alone. And though she let him see that she understood what he conveyed, she thought again, crossly, "These men I"

They finished off lunch with slices of papaw sprinkled with lemon juice and sugar, after which their goods were packed back into the cars, the hut keys were surrendered and the four of them took their places for the journey. There seemed to be no question about who should accompany whom. Lou slipped in beside George; Nadine, in Damon's car, waved as they went off first. George said, "Well, there goes the comet. We shan't see them again before Lusaka." Lou only nodded, but she could have uttered a shaky but heartfelt, "Thank heaven!"

CHAPTER XIII THE following day was one of endless, wearisome travelling. Having spent a sleepless night, Lou tried, in her corner seat made comfortable with Dunlop cushions, to lose herself in unconsciousness. But the road, now they had left Lusaka far to the south-west, was primitive in patches, and even the excellent springs of the car could not mitigate all the bumps. She was with Damon. In the translucent dawn as they were preparing to leave the hotel, he had been alone with her for a moment. "I was led to believe," he said, hawk-eyed and sardonic, "that this journey across Africa had the sole object of bringing Brother George into close daily contact with the woman of his heart. So far you've done your best to keep them apart, but today, I think, must be theirs. You'll have to travel with me, child, but you needn't talk." ' She hadn't replied, of course. How could one respond to frigid sarcasm and keep one's dignity? When it was time to start she had got in beside him; as usual his car had slid away first, and since looking back to see George pull out from the kerb she .had had no glimpse at all of the other car. The speed Damon kept up was terrific, but for all that the road went on unfolding in front of them, for the most part straight and deserted with dense bush on either side and an occasional few miles of savanna which allowed a view of distant mountains that were strangely misted over their grape-coloured summits." "I don't like that mist," Damon said once. "These roads are fiendish in the rain." For Lou's part, she hardly imagined that rain could make much difference. It would certainly have its work cut out to worsen

Damon's mood. So she pretended to be asleep and made no response. Just before Nyimba he stopped, made her take a short brisk walk in the shade of the msuku trees and drink some black coffee. She didn't want black coffee, but after he had forced her to take it she admitted his wisdom. She felt more alive and less sorry for herself. Drenched in sweat and with the muzzy head engendered by the heat, it was too easy to pity oneself. When they were on their way again he gave her a slanting glance. "Aren't you curious as to where we are?" "Of course. I didn't think you cared to talk about it." "In less than four hours we'll be crossing the Malawi border." "I suppose to you that means you're nearly home." "Not really. My district is four hundred miles from Blantyre. In any case, my home is Redlands." She allowed a few seconds to elapse before saying, "We're being awfully polite, aren't we?" He shrugged non-committally. "Isn't that the way you want it? After all, here in the dark middle of Africa you're very much at my mercy, and I'm not so easy to handle as George. You made me very angry yesterday, and I don't think even you would be unwise enough to repeat the performance so soon." In a rather small voice she said, "You're still angry. It wasn't my fault the horrid monkeys crowded round us." "I'd told you before not to touch the babies. It's dangerous to play with the young of any type of animal if the parents are around - you

know that. It's typical of you that you did it on the edge of a waterfall!" "Perhaps," she said, in the same remote little tones, "it's as well we shall be parting in a day or two. I'm sure you'd never let me forget it." "Are we parting so soon?" he asked evenly. "I hadn't heard." "Isn't George escorting us to the coast from Blantyre?" "It was mentioned - but you haven't taken into consideration the possibility that Nadine will stay on in Africa. If she does, you'll probably remain with her." She stared at him, fearfully. "I can't stay! I won't. I'll go home alone." "Really?" he said coolly. "I was under the impression you'd do anything for Nadine." Lou was suddenly sickened and trembling. Ever since leaving Bulawayo she had fought away from the aching emptiness into which she would be plunged once she had said good-bye to Damon. Last night she had lain in a bath of sweat inside the mosquito net and told herself that Damon could have this filthy climate. She would be glad to get away from it, and from him. Glad, glad. And then she had met him this morning in the hotel vestibule. He had looked as if he hadn't rested too well himself, and her heart had turned with the anxiety which is every woman's when the man she loves appears unwontedly tired. But his enquiry about the sort of night she'd had was no less mocking than she would normally have expected, and her worry had gradually fallen away. Damon wasn't tired; he was merely taciturn.

Now, though, she was frightened by the immensity and depth of her own feelings, appalled by the hopelessness of them. And because worry and fear had crowded upon her together, she swallowed on the mound in her throat and turned to look through the window at the eternal trees. Damon did not pursue the subject. For a long while he drove in silence, and presently he was able, without being trite, to comment upon the weather. For they were running straight into a thin mountain mizzle which reduced visibility to a few yards. At a quarter to one he pulled in at the side of the road and leaned over the back of the seat for the picnic case. "We'll have a couple of sandwiches and go straight on," he said. "We may get through this spot of wet before it rains heavily." "What about the others?" "George won't stop for long, either." "Didn't you and he arrange to meet somewhere?" "No. He'd naturally stop if he saw this car parked along the road. That's all that's necessary." He put an egg sandwich into her hand. "Come on, now. I know you feel like hell, but eat it." "How do you know I... feel like hell?" "Because you look it," he said curtly, "and I feel like hell myself." She found some courage, or perhaps it was because everything outside herself and Damon mattered so little now they were nearing the end, that she was able to say, "What is it about me that exasperates you, Damon - apart from the foolish habit of playing with baby animals, I mean?"

"Do you want the truth?" he asked, his ghost of a smile very grim. "Yes." "Well, in the first place I dislike your youthfulness - the girlishness which made you want to rescue Val Marston and run the schoolchildren backwards and forwards in the jeep. Also, you're physically brave but a moral coward where men are concerned. Thirdly, you've set me the only insoluble problem I've ever encountered in my life. And don't ask me to elucidate; it would take too long." He put his head out of the window. "I think we'll push on, and you'll have to eat as we go." Presently they ran out of the rain, but the sky, which had been benignly blue before they had run into the mist, was now darkly overcast, the clouds queerly outlined in bright copper. The trees were etched blackly against it, and the blue roller birds which hurried into the branches were raven- dark, their low cries ominous. The tourer was the only car to go through the customs at Fort Manning, and Damon's papers ensured him polite and brief attention. The smart African official handed back Lou's passport and bowed low to Damon. "The bwana will please come into the office. We have a letter received by runner this morning from Mr. Thorpe." Damon frowned. "Here? I was expecting one in Blantyre, but hardly thought they'd send it to the border." He went into the building and came out slitting an envelope. He stood outside the car, reading the letter, and Lou saw the envelope was marked "Urgent and Confidential". Quite clearly, though it came softly, she heard him say, "Damn !" and follow up with something rather stronger.

He 'stuffed the letter into his pocket, got in behind the wheel and let in the clutch. Lou saw his lip go between his teeth, and wondered despairingly, "What now?" But she didn't have to ask, nor was she prepared for what came. "Before I left Redlands," he explained. "I naturally wrote to headquarters telling them when I expected to reach Blantyre. I'm not due in my own district for over a week, but apparently something has cropped up which requires inv mediate attention and my relief is sick. This letter instructs me to go north. The case is to start the day after tomorrow, and I have to make myself familiar with all the details." "What case?" "It doesn't matter," he answered irritably. "It's simply that I can't take you south to Blantyre. About eighty miles from here I have to branch north. You must go on with George and Nadine." Lou couldn't take it in. Her head seemed to have gone completely hollow and her heart felt as if it were beating all over her body. She looked at his lean, strong hands resting on the wheel of the car, at his profile, arrogant, angry and slightly Romanesque. Time, she had once heard someone say, means nothing where love is concerned; yet all she could think of was that in an hour, or maybe two, she would be saying good-bye to Damon. And she would never see him again. It was like ... dying. She became conscious that her mouth was parted, and parched with the effort of taking air into her depleted lungs. She tried to pull her shattered thoughts together. A gigantic wind tore through the growth. Lightning rent the black canopy overhead, a furious spurt of flame which licked straight down into the trees. Thunder crashed along the sky, another violet-

hued zigzag of lightning and the sudden, frightful hammering upon the car of hailstones as big as walnuts. The onslaught «was so tremendous that Damon had to stop. "Don't be frightened," he said. "Hail never lasts long." She wasn't frightened. She wasn't anything. This particular hailstorm went on for about five minutes. She lay back damply in her corner, and at last her chaotic thoughts formed into the single bleak reflection that she had known all along what it was that was ruining these days with Damon; the sense of approaching climax, the foreknowledge of doom. But it is one thing to know that the end must come some time, and quite another to be confronted with it swiftly and inexorably. She felt battered and torn, as if her mind had been exposed to elements like those raging out there. The cessation of the hailstones was the signal for the continuation of thunder and lightning. Damon drove on in a deluge, the windows steamed up inside and cascading on the outside. Windscreen wipers were useless; never for a second could he see the tumultuous red river of the road, and when a tree by the roadside was uprooted, the car, negotiating the branches which sprawled across the road, rocked perilously to one side. His teeth were set, his jaw taut. His lips almost unmoving, he said, "This is only an appetizer for the real rains. How would you like to live through six months of them?" Mechanically, her heart so constricted that it was a concentrated physical pain, she answered, "It's the first genuine rain I've seen in Africa. If we weren't driving through it I'd like it." He gave a short, hard laugh. "We shan't be driving through it much longer. Some way up here to the right there's an old resthouse. If I

don't overshoot it we'll stop there till this gives over. I don't mind sloshing through rivers, but I do prefer to see them." The car was slithering, hitting great rocks which had been washed into the road. With the tumult of rain and peal after peal of thunder came the heavily-liquid swishing of the car wheels through axledeep water. They crawled on. Damon wound down his window, letting in a windswept torrent, and in a minute or two he stopped. "I believe this is it. The path to the hut is badly overgrown, but I recognize the aloes at the entrance to it. Just in case I'm mistaken you'd better wait while I take a look." "But you'll get drenched in a few seconds! Couldn't we sit in the car till the rain stops?" She looked at him with the curious detachment of grief. "If you were alone you'd drive on, wouldn't you?" "I'm not alone," he said abruptly, as he pulled on a raincoat. "I'd never have brought you if I'd thought we'd hit anything like this. It's at least a month earlier than usual." He pushed the buttons of his coat into their holes. "We probably have this road to ourselves, but I can't take a chance on it. May I remind you once more that you're in Africa now, and everything here is man-size, particularly the storms. Sit tight, I'm going to open the door." He did, and Lou saw the rust-coloured, swirling water into which his feet and ankles disappeared, after which the door slammed and she caught only his vague outline in the torrent before that, too, vanished. She slumped back, exhausted and oddly cold. She ought to have longed to cry, to abandon herself to the stark tragedy of loving where love was not wanted. She ought to have wrung her hands or buried her face. But, curiously, she knew no urge to do any of these

things. It was as though her heart, once the hysterical pounding had diminished, had become encased in ice which numbed it. She looked out at the grey curtain of rains, listened to the ceaseless battering on the roof of the car and felt the cool moistness of the atmosphere even though the windows were closed. And she thought how very strange it was that she, Lou Meredith, should be here in Central Africa with Damon Thorpe, who, in a moment of truth, had admitted that he would have to be a lunatic to marry her. He was back, swinging open the door and almost hurling himself into his seat. His head and face streamed, the raincoat was black and dripping and his feet and stockinged legs were saturated. "The hut's there, all right," he said. "It's leaking at one end but is mainly dry, and there's a bed of sorts and a couple of stools. We'll wait there till George and Nadine turn up." Lethargically she said, "Isn't it better to drive a car than to leave it standing in a torrent?" "It can't be helped. When I've got you into the hut I'll get out a groundsheet and cover the bonnet. And I'll leave the tail lights on so that George can't miss it. You'd better wrap yourself in this other waterproof of mine. Put it right over your head.... and let me button it." The violence of the storm, when she floundered into it, was ten times greater than Lou had imagined. In spite of her face being nearly covered, great lumps of rain hit her cheeks with the force of pebbles, and before she had moved three yards she was wet to the knees. Damon hauled her close to him, compelled her to move at his speed along a swampy footpath converted into a tunnel by overhanging bush. With ferocious strength he shoved aside a sapling, and when

the path opened into the tiny clearing he swept her across the lake of it, and through an opening into the thatched hut. Without giving her time to regain her breath he dragged off the waterproof which had enveloped her and made her sit on the end of the bed while he pulled off her shoes. "Good thing you're wearing shorts today," he said. "Feel . wet anywhere else?" "No, but you're soaked. Please don't go out there again, Damon." "I must. I can't risk having the car waterlogged, and we may as well eat some of that food we neglected. Don't walk about with bare feet till I get back. There may be scorpions." He was gone, and Lou sat there at the foot of the low iron bed like a forlorn child. There was no blanket on the bed, and the mattress cover had rotted in places to disclose the coconut fibre stuffing. It smelled of mildew. The hut was a dim little room with a single glassless window, over which a strip-bamboo screen had been nailed askew. The log door hung on leather hinges and quivered and creaked incessantly in the wind. At some time the walls had been whitewashed. Now, the whitewash stood out in huge flakes on the ends of fungus growths, and runnels of mud showed where the rain was finding its way through the vermin-bitten thatch and down the walls. There was no ceiling; merely the tented roof of closely-woven reeds resting on thin log beams which were festooned with cobwebs. In her white shirt and blue shorts Lou shivered. She supposed it was better than sitting in the car, and the rain did seem to have set in for a while.

Damon came in, looking enormous and grotesque. From inside his coat he produced cushions, a big towel, the picnic box, a pair of brogues and several other oddments. He took off the coat and she saw that his shirt clung with sweat and rain from shoulder to waist. "Did you bring in a dry shirt?" she involuntarily demanded. He nodded matter-of-factly. "Take the cushions, lie back and find something of absorbing interest in the roof. I won't be long." She obeyed him, and as she lay gazing at a bat which hung upside down in the apex of the roof, she let her thoughts wander along acid-sweet paths of intimacy. U.N. workers did have wives who travelled round with them and spent nights with them in isolated resthouses, and presumably they were happy. Damon wouldn't admit that, of course. According to him, it wasn't the husband who kept a wife happy in the jungle; she kept her sanity by following some sort of craze. All in all, he didn't know an awful lot about women. At his age he must have had affairs, and the fact that he could turn on the charm when it suited him was proof that he was by no means ignorant of an important aspect of womanhood. But what could he know about simple women - the sort who really would suffer pests and heat to be with the man they loved? "Do you often have to stay in places like this?" she asked, apparently of the bat. "Good lord, no. The government resthouses are very good, and when it's dry, I camp." He took time off to struggle into or out of something. "This hut was put up some years ago by a man who was in charge of bridge building lower down the road. When he left it a native chief took it over on the understanding that if he saw it was kept clean he could charge so much a night to any traveller who

might like to use it. By the look of the place it's hardly a paying proposition." He began a vigorous rubbing. "All clear. You can sit up again." He was drying his hair, and slicking it back, dark and damp, with a comb he had taken from the pocket of his shorts. In the strange light he looked fresh and bronzed, and there seemed to be a smile about his lips, a sharp, slightly cynical smile. "I brought you a pair of my khaki stockings," he said. "They'll keep off the mosquitoes." He got down on one knee and indicated the other. "Put your foot there." "I don't want those things on my legs. They'll make me look hideous." "Is that important? I'm the only one who'll see you." "George is sure to get here soon." "And George" - sarcastically - "must only see you at your best." He took her ankle firmly and fitted the big khaki sock over her foot. Thoughtfully, as if the matter had an almost academic interest for him, he added, "I wonder if there's something of Val in George, something that makes a little woman like you very anxious that he should have all the things likely to make him happy. You'd do a lot for George, wouldn't you?" "I happen to like him." "As much as you like Val?" "More. Val used to scare me, but George doesn't." "Steadfast George," he said with the same sharp mockery. He smoothed the stocking professionally up her leg and turned down a

big chunk of it just below her knee. "You're quite sure," he asked, with studied ordinariness, "that Val is out of your system, aren't you? Do you ever think about him?" "I've dreamt about him once or twice." "Have you?" The second stocking was half on, and he paused, looking into her face. "Grisly dreams?" "Not very nice. I can never remember clearly afterwards, but in the dream I seem to be in the car, rushing into blackness. And I can hear Val saying ..." She stopped, and bent to pull up the stocking and turn the top to match the other. "Go on," said Damon peremptorily. "What does he say?" "It's silly, because he didn't really say it at all. I'm sure of that." "But what is it!" "Don't shout." She moistened her lips which had gone queerly dry. "In the dream he said, 'If I can't have you I'll make sure that no one else will.' You know how utterly stupid dreams are." "He was capable of saying it - and thinking it too." Damon leaned over and held fast on to her elbow. His expression was earnest, even a little tender. "Don't let that sort of nonsense spoil your sleep. Someone else will have you, all right. You were made to be loved. Why," he ended teasingly, standing up suddenly and dusting off his knee, "I wouldn't find it hard to make love to you myself." But his tone held a note of finality which forbade further speculation on that particular topic. He searched over the floor, ground out one or two crawlies with his heel and spread the picnic sandwiches and fruit over the larger of the two stools. It was growing dark. The thin pencils of light

through the bamboo screen at the window went swiftly greyer and then black, and there was no hope of even the smallest radiance from so thunderous a night. The rain beat mercilessly about them, rivulets seeped under the door and the pool below the window spread right across the room and under the bed. Lou managed one sandwich and a banana. She heard a scuttering behind her, and Damon switched on the flashlight. "What was it? " she whispered. "A rat. Shall I leave the torch on?" "Not if you don't want to waste the battery. I'm not really afraid." Oddly enough, that was true. Tropical rats, she was aware, were often huge, but had she felt one 'scampering over her unshod foot she would not have screamed. What was a rat, or even one of the jungle beasts which doubtless prowled these forests on fine nights, compared with the knowledge that when the rain ceased Damon would travel on and out of her life? "What's the time?" she queried, presently. "A quarter to eight. Feels like midnight, doesn't it?" "Do you think George and Nadine will come?" "I'm beginning to doubt it. George wouldn't travel in the rain in darkness." "Supposing he came along before it was dark and didn't see the car." "He'd see it, all right, because of those rear lights. Even in rain such as this they're pretty powerful." "Mightn't he be down there, near it, wondering where we are?"

"Stop fretting. George knows this place better than I do. He was an irrigation officer in this district. The bridge was built while he was here." A silence followed. The rat scratched again, and Damon gathered up the remains of their food and threw it into a corner. Lou heard him easing his big frame on the stool, and then he got out cigarettes and they smoked, without speaking. He was walking around the confined space, standing silhouetted by lightning for a moment near the crude window. His cigarette would glow in the darkness, showing where he stood, and once she heard him let out a breath of exasperation. This was torture to both of them, she thought dully. A different type of torture for him, though. He was chafing to get going, to branch north and cover the three or four hundred miles to his bungalow. "Is Shimwe your district or just the place where; you live?" she asked. He gave a brief, surprised laugh. "How did you know I was thinking about Shimwe? Who told you the name, anyway?" "George, a long time ago. What is it like there?" "Very pleasant in the dry season. There are thick forests, some wonderful trees that arch over the road for miles and miles. In a short distance you climb three thousand feet to a highland where there's plenty of game and some very beautiful birds. You'd love the flowers there. On the edge of my district we have one of the smaller lakes and in its way it's just as lovely as Lake Malawi; I like it better because it doesn't attract tourists." "Is it really terrible in the rains?" "Yes," he answered crisply, "it is. When the rain stops the place is like a hothouse, humid, sultry and breathless, and you get the feeling

that everything about you is growing with an evil intensity. Tempers get frayed, and you only eat because if you didn't you'd die. The boys are sullen and lazy and there's more crime in the villages." He paused. "Funny I should be telling you this in the eleventh hour. I suppose it's because you've never permitted yourself to show any interest before." She didn't counter this statement. She had drawn her feet up on to the bed, and thinking of him, serene in that bungalow in the midst of rain and decay, her fingers tightened round her ankles. "Would you rather be alone there?" she said. "Than be married? I'm not crazy, neither do I chase disaster. Daphne used to call me a woman-hater when I said I wouldn't take a wife to my job, but I always told her it was because I had no wish to be a woman-hater that I wouldn't consider marriage while I'm bound to Malawi." Lou turned her head towards the corner where she knew him to be standing. "Had you heard," she discovered herself enquiring quite steadily, "that Daphne is planning to marry an old admirer of hers?" "Is she?" He sounded careless, but Damon could sound whatever he liked. "I did write to her in Cape Town, but she didn't answer — at least, not before I came away. I guess she was still hipped." Lou gripped her ankles still more tightly. "Was she annoyed with you about something?" "I suppose she had reason. I got so hot about one thing and another the day we found you doubled up in Val's car that no one was safe. Daphne came to me and apologized for her straight talking to Val the night before, but it was too late - the damage was done. I'm afraid I let her have it. After she'd gone and you were better I

penned her a few words, but they couldn't have been contrite enough." "Do you mean that. .. you more or less sent her away?" "Hardly that. She was pining for England, if you remember. All I did was tell her that Cape Town was a far more lively spot in which to wait for a boat." "You can be very cruel." To still the shaking which had seized her body she pressed her bony little chin hard upon 'her knee. Then she said quietly, "Both Nadine and I thought you were piqued because Daphne had walked out on you. In fact, you've been in such a bad mood most of the journey that we rather gathered it might be more than ... pique." "Did you?" His voice was totally without expression. "What splendid times you women have together." He went silent. Nothing unpleasant about it; it was merely a natural end to a fruitless conversation. Lou became conscious of the increasing roar of the rain. The lightning was more frequent now, rending the heavens with an audible crack followed by crescendoes of ear-splitting thunder. She had never before lived through such a storm yet she was not frightened, only horribly exhausted and mentally bruised. Her nerves were strung on tight wires, and the silent minutes dragged unbearably. She had to speak. "I suppose we shall have to travel through the night?" "We can't go on tonight. Even if the rain stopped, there's been so much of it that it would be asking for trouble if we started out in the dark. In any case, I can't leave you till George shows up." "Do we sleep... here?"

"It's grim, I grant you, but this is the first rain, so the bed will be dry, even if it is a bit dusty." "What about you?" "I'll manage something with the stools." He moved and snapped on the torch. "Let's get you fixed up. You must be worn out." Lou shrank from the approaching beam of light and stood up quickly. He illumined the bed, flicked it with a handkerchief and rearranged the two cushions so that her head and shoulders would rest on them. He turned to her, and she saw his face, dark, unreadable, the light shining queerly across his cheekbones. Her own face was white, and startled, her eyes shadowed with a groping unhappiness which he must have seen. The light vanished, his hand went to her waist and she trembled. "Oh, God," he said savagely. "It can't be as bad as that." She had no idea what he meant, was given no time to find out. The hand closed hard over the soft flesh of her side, his other arm went round her, a steel band over which he bent her back, ruthlessly, till their mouths met. He kissed the curve of her neck and the hollow of her throat, finding them unerringly in the darkness, and the pressure of his lips was a pain and a bliss she knew not how to support. Something of the limpness of her surrender got through to him. He let her go, abruptly. His voice was thick with curbed violence. "That's what you've been expecting, isn't it? You've been sitting there shivering, remembering all the things you'd heard about men and women thrown together in the jungle, no man is to be trusted in circumstances like these! Well, you've had your thrill and there's no more to it - not a thing. Now get some sleep !"

Lou sank down into the cushions. She felt drained and empty, and tiredness settled upon her like a mantle. Some time later she heard the sharp crack of a match and caught the drift of cigarette smoke, but she did not open her eyes. She felt it wouldn't matter if she never opened them again.

CHAPTER XIV THE rain-washed dawn seeped through the bamboo screen at the window and crept over the muddy floor from under the log door. A lizard clung static to the wall, and not far above it, in a crevice, sat a huge, somnolent spider, its black furry legs hanging there like large wisps left behind by a feather duster. Lou awakened suddenly and completely. Almost at once she was gripped by a formless dread, but some sixth sense kept her supine while her ears strained to take in what was going on about her. There was nothing to hear but the shrill chirping of crickets and cicadas. The rain had stopped, the air was still, and with every minute light grew in the room, a milky light, as if the sun were already drawing up yesterday's moisture. Cautiously, Lou turned her head. She saw the two stools placed neatly against the wall and across them her own pink linen dress and some clean white underwear. On the floor stood a pair of her own shoes. She sat up quickly; she had the hut to herself. There was a big paraffin tin full of water, a towel and some soap. As women will, even in moments of the utmost stress, she thought how ghastly she must look. She stood out on the floor, bent and stripped the khaki stockings from her legs and, without allowing herself to think, she washed as thoroughly as possible and got into clean garments. She took a comb from her handbag and tidied her hair, had turned back to the bed in order to fold the soiled clothes when there came a rap at the door, and it opened. "Good morning," said Nadine. "You certainly look more yourself now than you did half an hour ago, but the rain seems to have washed you white, my dear."

It was then that Lou looked round the hut and realized why the place appeared so bare. Damon's things had gone, all of them but the two cushions and the pair of socks. She went oddly weak at the knees but contrived a faint smile. "I knew you'd be somewhere about. Thanks for getting out my dress." Then, with a scarcely-disguised catch in her voice, "Where's Damon?" "He's left us. You knew he had to go north?" "He might have said good-bye." "To be candid, darling, I think he was keen to be away before you woke up. He was out on the road packing his goods in the tourer when we arrived. He told George you were to have an injection right away and to take paludrine every day just in case of the mosquitoes that were about in the night happened to be malarial. Five minutes after that he churned off through the mud." Lou went to the doorway and breathed in some of the hot mist. Offhandedly she said, "Well, that's the end of Damon." "Not quite. He'll be back this way in about a week. Today, we're supposed to book in at a hotel on Lake Malawi, and George promised we'd stay there till Damon comes. I don't see why we shouldn't." Lou stared out at the tall, delicate tracery of tropical ferns, at the grey trunks of palms, and at the close-growing trees beyond. The path she and Damon had fought their way along yesterday was thick pink mud with long grasses and rubbery weeds trampled into it, and on each side valiant jungle flowers were opening, pale mauve trumpets against the dark, succulent foliage. Odd to think that this was what the rain had been beating into last night.

She looked at Nadine. "You're bandbox-fresh. What did you do during the storm?" "We stayed at a mission from four o'clock yesterday afternoon till four this morning. George knew the old chap from years ago and had decided to drop in on him some time before it rained. While we were there it started to thunder, so we decided to accept the missionary's hospitality." Nadine laughed affectionately. "It was certainly much more conventional than the way you spent the night." She nodded down the path. "Here's George, now." What with the injection, the clearing of the hut and the fitting of Lou into the crowded back seat of George's car, something like normality began to descend upon her. The roaring blackness, with Damon nearby, furious and contemptuous and completely mistaken about her reactions, was away in the past. The fact that he had kissed her with angry passion was not even very real except when she touched her side where he had bunched the flesh in his grip. He would have kissed any woman with whom he might have found himself alone in the teeming African darkness. He had as good as admitted it. So much seemed to have happened since she last saw Nadine that this morning's travelling, though necessarily slow, was helped along by descriptions of the mission and the natives there, the exceeding plainness of the food, and the cheerful courage of the missionary who lived without white companionship in an area where there were thirty thousand Africans. They had a late breakfast at Lilongwe and drove straight on to the Lake. Blantyre, George thought, could wait a day or two. They had earned a lakeside holiday. Nadine agreed, and Lou hardly cared where she went. The hotel in which he installed them was large and luxurious for Central Africa and, the season being over, he had no difficulty in

obtaining three large rooms overlooking the Lake. The service, as in most hotels staffed mainly by Africans, was superb, and though the weather, after those initial rains, settled into a steaming heat which brought out every conceivable type of pest in myriads, it was seldom that a breeze did not blow across those blue and beautiful waters. The peace of the great inland sea, edged with a density of growth which for miles was impenetrable, soothed Lou into a mood of dull resignation. The few other hotel guests were all men, and uncomplainingly she spent the evenings pretending to be awed or amused or astonished by their big- game hunting exploits." George, who had only shot buck for food, was considered rather a poor fish by these men who had bought licences to kill a certain number of big beasts. He, of course, was not a bit put out. He loved wild things, so he wouldn't have derived much pleasure from shooting them. He took the two women yachting on the Lake, showed them, from the deck, some of the dainty falls which drained into it and picked wild bananas from the tall, ragged plants which leaned over, like the proverbially vain palms, to admire their reflections. For the fun of it, he took them ashore on the eastern bank and told them they were now illegal immigrants in Mozambique. That night, after she had left the other two, Lou went out to her balcony and gazed towards Mozambique, thirty miles away across the Lake. She could hear natives talking down below, and the beach was a calm white strip lapped by little waves. Once the heat of the day was past, this place was a paradise. It was on her second evening, after an hour or two with the he-man group in the hotel lounge, that Lou leant over her balcony wall to trace the subtle flower scent that wafted upwards.

And as she bent she saw George and Nadine walking down the path towards the beach. Impossible to catch even the cadence of their voices, but there was no mistaking their intimacy. Nadine had put her hand in the crook of his arm and George pulled it further in, patting it as he did so. He said something which made Nadine slow down and raise her head. For a moment she appeared to disagree flatly with him, a moment which ended with his putting his hand along her face and kissing her. The entire naturalness of the kiss, its lack of passion, told Lou they had kissed before, undoubtedly with more warmth. She retreated into her bedroom and mechanically began to untie the cord which held back the mosquito net. She was in bed, and the light out, when Nadine came up to her adjoining room. The very next day, when the two women sat beneath a gay umbrella above the beach, Nadine told Lou that she and George were going to be married. She gave a self-deprecating little laugh, as though she found herself both astounding and comical, but her dark eyes held an unwonted softness. "I'll make a rotten wife, of course, but George is fully reconciled to that. I believe he's going to enjoy watching me make a mess of housekeeping, but I may surprise him. After all, one must do something, and if I give up my work my energies will have to find an outlet elsewhere. I may even become a passable cook." "I'm awfully glad," Lou said sincerely. "You two will be wonderfully happy — I'm sure of it. And you can still draw and paint; think what marvellous subjects there are in Africa! The Africans and their villages, the animals, the mountains. I'm so happy for you, Nadine, and for George." "I knew you would be." With seeming irrelevance, Nadine added, "I wish you could be happy for yourself as well."

"When are you going to be married?" Lou asked. "We haven't settled any details. I expect George will build at Four Winds. Strange, isn't it? Wouldn't Uncle Simon chuckle if he could see me being led back, a bride, to Four Winds!" "Judging by his poetry he was very human. I think it would have pleased him to know you'd live there as a wife; he did want you to do something worthwhile!" She smiled shakily. "I'm going to miss you, though!" Nadine tattooed with her fingernails on the iron table, then rested her elbows on the table top and looked earnestly at the young face opposite. "Why don't you make your home with us, Lou? Your father doesn't need you now - I don't intend anything hurtful by that, but he has got Netta. We could have great times together. You never have blamed George for Val's instability - not even as much as I did - and I'm sure you and he would make first-rate cousins." Live next door to Redlands! Nadine didn't realize what she was suggesting. "I have to earn a living." Lou answered, "and we've already discovered I can't do it in Mlemba. I'd rather go home. The hotel manager tells me there's a private bus from here going through to Beira with several empty seats. He thought there would be plenty of room on the boat, too, at this time of the year." "But the bus leaves the day after tomorrow!" Lou nodded, her eyes averted. "I'd like to wait and see you and George married" - would she, though, with Damon the suave best man and herself the wistful bridesmaid? — "but you know how it is. I just haven't the cash to go on kicking around Africa." "My dear, you must hang on till Damon comes."

"For the fond good-bye?" Lou observed bitterly. "He loathes them, and so do I. It's no use, Nadine. This is where I slide out." Nadine sighed. Damon again; she wished she'd forced herself to talk to Lou about this, but it was too late now. "Look here," she stated firmly, "if you're going to England I'll go with you. I've told George I won't let you make the voyage home alone." "Don't be absurd — I'm nearly twenty-one. Your place now is with him." "Not yet. I'll come back to him. He'll understand." "You can't do that. He deserves some happiness — not to have you tear yourself away the minute he's found it. You couldn't wound him like that." Obstinately for her, Nadine said, "There must be some easier course. Remember how you used to talk about getting a job in Bulawayo and coming to Four Winds at weekends?" "Everything is different now. I've left Rhodesia and it wouldn't do me any good to go back there." On the point of further remonstrance, Nadine stopped. She looked up at the terrace of the hotel and saw George wave his hand. With a resigned shrug she got up. "I'll see you later, Lou. Don't brood, there's a pet." For the rest of that day and most of the next Lou kept out of the way of the other two. She saw them at meal-times, congratulated and teased George, daring him, by her brittle brightness, to put in his word against her departure. It was not difficult to avoid them because one of the younger hotel guests was a keen fisherman and eager to teach her the absorbing

mysteries of fly-fishing. She didn't like fishing, and the thrashing silvery bodies in the bucket of water that stood in the bottom of the small boat filled her with pity and disgust, but her companion did help, in his abstracted fashion, to keep her emotions well battened down. Romance for him was in the sleek beauty of a water- dweller, and for adventure he desired nothing more spectacular than the weeks just before his holiday, when he prepared his rods and nylon, lovingly bought flies and oiled his rod support. Next year he hoped to do some whale fishing on the south coast. They came in from the lake that second day at about five. George and Nadine were in the entrance lounge of the hotel, both of serious mien till Lou joined them. "How many did you land?" George wanted to know. "He got about a dozen, all sizes and colours. I believe they've put me off eating fish for the rest of my life. Am I too late for some tea?" "It's never too late for tea, and you can depend on Nadine to drink a cup with you." He signalled a boy and gave the order. "It's a little early for a sundowner, but I think I'll have one as soon as your tea comes." Lou dropped into a basket chair and pushed back the hair which had blown into stringy curls about her forehead. She looked down pensively at the knees of her creased slacks. "I suppose it isn't really worth getting any ironing done here. They may as well do the lot on the boat. By the way, I booked a place on the bus but haven't been given a ticket. Have you heard anything about it? "

"Yes." George slapped the sides of his jacket. "One of the messengers gave it to me. I was wearing my tweed coat and must have left it in the pocket. I'll get it for you when I go upstairs." No pleading, not even a polite regret that she would not wait till George could drive her to the coast. They had given in; her decision had been accepted as final. She had a cup of tea and left Nadine pouring a second cup while George drank a whisky and soda. She had a bath and brushed her hair, belted the thin silk dressing-gown about her and went out to sit in the balcony of her bedroom. She couldn't see the sunset; only its reflections of gilt ridges across the Lake, a dusting of gold over the approaching velvet of night. She had not been there ten minutes before it was quite dark. To one aspect of Nadine's marriage she had so far given no thought. But it came to her now, with the sureness of a knife-thrust. Nadine would write to her in England. Month by month she would hear of the happenings at Four Winds . .. and at Redlands. Lou would never be able to cut herself free from Rhodesia unless she told Nadine, unequivocally, that she wanted to hear nothing more from her. Lou's eyes smarted and her teeth went together. It was unfair and abominable, the way things had turned out. Only a few months ago she, Nadine and Daphne had driven up to Four Winds, anticipating a glorious, unusual holiday in warm, hospitable Rhodesia. The shabbiness of the shanty and their own comparative poverty were merely a challenge, and those first uneventful weeks had been the happiest Lou had ever known. Nadine had settled in with her usual calm acceptance of the inevitable, and even Daphne had derived a degree of pleasure from the total change from England. Then things had happened with the inescapable swiftness and inexorability of a landslide, and here was the result. Daphne had

blithely sailed home into the arms of a man who had loved her even while she was infatuated with someone else, and Nadine had found a good, solid husband. But Lou had been left out, and into the bargain she had to lose Nadine, who was the only woman with whom she had ever been close friends. Lou got up out of the rattan chair and shook herself. How many times had she told herself lately that self-pity could only exaggerate her unhappiness! She did wish, though, that she were going home by air. Those endless days and nights on the ship were going to be intolerable. Glasses were clinking on the terrace below. She ought to get into a frock and go down. Anything would be better than sitting up here alone in the dark. There came a hard tap at the door. Thinking that George had sent her a cocktail, she called, "Come in," and went to the bedside table to switch on the lamp. The light flowered. Lou straightened and stared; the use went out of her limbs. "Damon," she breathed. "Yes, Damon," he said, and closed the door. His glance ran over her. "I thought you'd be dressed. Nadine said they were expecting you below for dinner." "It... won't take me long." He came across to her slowly, looked down at her with eyes that smouldered and yet were very weary. From his pocket he took a slip of paper which he smoothed and held out for her to read. It said: "Lou determined to sail at once. What shall I do. George."

"That reached me at an out-station at ten o'clock this morning," he said unemotionally. Her nerves were settling. She pushed a hand into her pocket and looked away, made a weak attempt at flippancy. "So one can send a telegram in this country. Did you come all this way to wish me bon voyage?" "No, I came to tell you you're not going. As soon as I can get my release I'm going to marry you." She didn't even try to believe it. It was too fantastic. But her voice shook uncontrollably. "Isn't that going to drastic lengths to keep me in the country?" "You don't realize how drastic. Nothing else would have made me resign." "You're ... resigning?" The grey eyes were wide now, filled with dawning hope, unbelief and a kind of horror. "Damon, you can't. Please ... if you mean what you said..." He did not touch her, but his tones were thick and unfamiliar; they seemed to reach out and pluck at her heartstrings. "Since the day I knew I loved you every damn thing has gone wrong. George bought Four Winds, and there was Val all feverish and above himself. I could see that you were in a sticky spot, and if it had been any other two men than George and Val I'd have had you out of it in no time." He broke off and tightened his jaw to stop the muscle working. "You're not listening!" She managed a choked little sentence. "It ... it wasn't hate when you kissed me the other night - at the hut?"

Sparks leapt in his eyes. "It was need. I'd held off too long." He took her shoulders, looked devouringly at her brilliant, half-frightened face. "I seem to be in the deuce of a fix, but if you love me it will work out. I'm sure of that. Do you love me, Louise?" "Of course." Her lips trembled into a smile which was near to tears. "That's my shoulder you're ... breaking." He took her tightly into his arms and spoke a little roughly against her cheek. "We've had the darnedest luck, you and I. We couldn't get close and my leave was slipping away. Then, after the crash with Val, I was afraid you hadn't even the remotest feeling for me. I know it was shock that made you like that, but it might have lasted much longer than it did. Those days at Redlands, while you were in Bulawayo and George was away, were a continuous nightmare. That was when I thought up the trip to the Falls." His lips turned and found the corner of her mouth. "Kiss me, Lou," he whispered urgently. "I don't feel I can discuss anything sanely till you've kissed me as though you love me." It was at least ten minutes later that he yielded to the pressure of her hands against his chest and released her. She was breathless, dusky-eyed and melting. "My darling," she said with a break in her tones, "what a beast you've been. If only you'd told me before." "What was the good? If you'd known you were falling in love with me you'd have taken my advice about Val; but you didn't. A few times I felt you were beginning to care, but there was nothing really tangible." "Damon, how long have you loved me?" He shook his head impatiently. "I don't know. I remember thinking, the first time you came to Redlands, that I'd met you a couple of

years too soon." He stared down at her, unsmiling. "I used to tell myself that I'd have to get over it, and when I became fairly sure that I never would get over it, I became angry with myself." "And with me?" She took his hand shyly. "Come and sit in the balcony. You look tired." He allowed her to lead him out there, but he made her take one of the chairs while he leant on the wall, facing her. "I've had a filthy week," he said, "bush travelling and palavering; and the devil of it is, I have to get back tomorrow and finish off the project. These African chiefs love arguing and if they realize you're trying to hurry them they spin it out even longer. In these times we have to be very patient with them." "Is the man who relieved you still sick?" "He's better, but not fit to travel. I'll have a week's freedom as soon as the case is ended, though." He leaned forward, searching the pale oval of her face. "You're very precious to me, Lou - so precious that I had to keep hurting you into an awareness of me. I wanted so much to tell you I loved you before I went north; that was why I cleared out before you woke up that last morning." "And you left me thinking you were sick to death of me. You might have given me something to hope for!" "My darling girl, I had to be able to offer you a husband some time soon. I've written to headquarters asking for my release, but I'm almost bound to have to put in six months. I know it sounds a lifetime, but it's not like two years." "You mean... we've got to part for six months?" "I wish to God," he said quietly, furiously, "that there were some other way."

Lou said, a little woodenly, hesitantly, "There is another way, of course, but you won't consider it. You don't want to give up these two years in Malawi, do you?" "If I could do it honourably, I'd walk out tomorrow," he told her decisively. "Let me put it another way. If you could have the two years and we could be married as well..." "It's out of the question. I've told you a hundred times I wouldn't take a wife to my district. We're just a handful of white people and you'd be bored and lonely. It isn't only the climate; you're young enough to stand up to that and we all take preventive medicines. But I'm away half the time, and I'd worry myself sick over you." "I'd travel with you, Damon," she pleaded. He let out an angry sigh. "That would be just as dangerous for you and probably just as boring. It's no way to start a marriage. I've seen too many couples hit the rocks to risk it myself." His hand moved caressingly over her silk- clad arm, tightened a little as he added, "George and Nadine will be getting married very soon, and they'll be staying at Redlands till their house is built. I want you to live with them, Lou, just for six months. Then we'll get married and have a honeymoon, and Redlands will be yours and mine." Not very distinctly he ended, "Please don't argue. It's the most difficult decision I've ever had to make." Lou didn't say anything. She took the hand from her shoulder and laid her cheek to it. And because her happiness was pierced by the corroding pain of postponed fulfilment, a few tears brimmed over, and one of them ran down his fingers. He made a small exclamation and drew her swiftly to her feet.

His teeth snapped. "You're not to make it harder - do you hear me! Do you think I don't want us to marry at once? Do you think I'm superhuman - that I don't get all the usual fears and despondency at the thought of our being parted for so long? We could be married in a few days - it wouldn't be hard to fix up - but if we did I couldn't let you go." Desperately, she locked her arms about his neck. "Marriage doesn't make all that difference. You can't let me go anyway," she cried. "If you won't promise to take me with you tomorrow, I'll... I'll get on that bus to Beira!" "They'd turn you back at the border," he said with a curt laugh. "Haven't you found out that your passport is missing from your bag?" "No!" "I took it as an additional precaution when I left you with George and Nadine at the resthouse. You see, t meant to have you." "Then take me, Damon," she begged, her words hurrying. "Cancel that letter of resignation and let me go where- ever you go. You say that marriages either come to grief or go stale in the tropics, that I'd be bored and lonely. I could never be bored and lonely with you, and, darling, I ... I love you too much ..." He dragged down her arms, not very gently. "You'll do what I feel is best," he said harshly, gripping her wrists together. "Get into a dress and come downstairs. I wouldn't have come up here if I'd thought it would be like this." "I believe in this one thing you're a coward, Damon." "You can't get at me with that kind of accusation. I'm thinking for both of us - for our future." Resolutely, he compelled her back into

the room, and he spoke coolly, dispassionately. "You were going off tomorrow, leaving me for good - which is something I couldn't possibly do to you. So don't try to persuade me that you can't live without me. You see, I've realized all along that I love you much more than you're capable of loving me. Don't protest. It's been too evident. It won't always be like that, though." He paused, but her mouth was too dry, her heart too constricted to permit a reply. "So now you can understand why I have to insist on your living with George and Nadine for a while," he went on, flat-toned. "I'm not doubting that you love me as much as you can. It's merely that your kind of love isn't strong enough to stand up to the heat and monotony of being a U.N. official's wife. Perhaps no woman can really love that way. I'm not blaming you. You're you, and it doesn't alter what I feel for you. We'll grow together, eventually." He put his hands into his pockets and took a pace towards the door. "You're bitter," she said in astonishment and hurt. A muscle contracted in his throat but he answered very calmly, "I suppose I am, a little. When you've waited as long as I have to fall in love you expect something special. Maybe you're just not old enough yet to give me all I want. I'll get over it, and you may grow up a bit during the next six months." Without a pause he added, "I'll wait for you down on the terrace," and then he walked out. Lou reached out for a chair and sank down into it. Damon was disappointed in her; he loved her, but his happiness in finding that she loved him, too, was tinged with acid, because he couldn't believe her love was deep enough. Didn't he realize that she hadn't yet had a chance to prove what she felt for him? Couldn't he be made to believe that there was nothing she would not do for his happiness? She remembered the way they had fought through the flood to the resthouse, his anxiety that she should not be plagued with dreams of

Val; and she thought back further, to his infinite tenderness when she had been bruised and shaken from the crash, the sternness with which he had insisted that the episode with Val was merely a spell of bad luck. He had got her over it all with astonishing speed, and then, unreasonably, become embittered because she had not at once turned to him. Didn't he see how difficult things were, for a woman? Was it fair to make them both suffer because she had been pardonably afraid to show her feelings? If only there were longer before they need come to a decision! Presumably, George would be returning to Rhodesia tomorrow, and Damon would expect her to go with him. When the case ended Damon would fly down for a few days, but once she was back there it would be more difficult than ever to persuade him that her place was here in Malawi, with him. He hated having to resign, and the pity of it was there was no real need for it. What were heat and boredom, the dangers of travel in wild places, compared with the long arid parting, and the knowledge that she would wrench him away from the work he most wanted to do? A little wearily she put on a figured blue frock and high- heeled sandals. The grey eyes which stared back from the mirror as she automatically applied lipstick and powder were dark and bewildered. Futilely, she wished she had known more of what was in Damon's mind during the past two weeks. She wished they hadn't talked tonight — merely been close and wordless, savouring the beauty and adventure of being in love. Hadn't he felt when they kissed that her need was as great as his; hadn't she conveyed to him her desperate longing to give and give, no matter what he asked? Sighing faintly, Lou went out of the room, along the corridor and down the wide, highly-polished stairs into the vestibule. In the porch she hesitated and looked along the terrace.

There he was, alone, near one of the discreet lamps which hung at intervals above the terrace wall. He was gazing out at the night, thinking, no doubt, that life was something of a fraud. For a moment Lou felt unequal to facing him again. How could she ever hope to prove to him that she was big enough to be loved by him; how to tell him that her bones melted at his approach, her heart ached with the longing to be everything he desired in a woman, always? She saw now that she had given to Val some of the tenderness which belonged to Damon; and she knew, deep inside, that to Daphne, Damon had given nothing, not even the kiss for which the blonde beauty had angled. Daphne Pryce had been no more important to him than a butterfly winging through his garden. Possibly he had hit on the truth. She, Lou, might be too young to comprehend his ruthless, one-track kind of love. But she couldn't suffer like this without becoming wise about him, and parting would be even worse suffering. Everyone else seemed to have gone in to dinner. Lou moved quietly along the terrace towards him. He saw her, turned to meet her in the dusk between two lamps. Her uplifted face mirrored the poignant entreaty of her thoughts, her eyes were misted with the sweetness of love, her lips had parted yet were silent, as if she knew the utter uselessness of words. Looking down at her he drew a sharp breath. An arm contracted about her while the other hand closed protectively over the back of her head and pressed her face to him. His breath warm in her hair, he said with a brief, unsteady laugh, "I ought to have proposed by letter. You're right - I can't let you go."