Hold Back the Dark Page 2

  Old designs of any sort, from wallpapers to blueprints, intrigued Clarry. ‘I’d like to see that,’ she replied.

  It seemed a fairly simple plan, in black lines on paper the colour of parchment in a narrow black frame. The entrance was opposite a shaded area representing the house, and Clarry trailed a finger on the glass the way they had gone, following the circuitous route to the centre and trying to memorise as she went. When Paul asked, ‘Will you join me in a coffee?’ she said,

  ‘No, thank you. I’ve enjoyed today, but tomorrow will be busy, I must say goodnight now.’

  She walked up the stairs, examining pictures and a blue and yellow glaze vase in a window alcove. There was a small bathroom next door to her bedroom, and she went in there first. She would return this jacket in the morning, and she was slipping it off when she missed her shoulder-bag. She had gone out with it, taking her torch out of it. The torch was in her jacket pocket now and she could have left the bag in the office.

  She hadn’t, though. What she had done was drop it on that seat when she sat down and took off her shoe. Then they had decided to turn back and she had walked away without it. It really didn’t matter; she could collect it in the morning.

  But it did have her cheque-book, her credit cards and her keys, and if it should ‘walk’ before she reached it that would be an awful nuisance. When she started thinking she knew she wouldn’t rest unless she fetched it.

  The seat was only a couple of turns into the maze and she had just finished memorising the plan. She had a torch, so if that bank of cloud should drift over the moon she would still be able to see her way.

  She hurried back across the turf and into the entrance, going confidently, the beam of her torch throwing a steady light. Here she turned right, then a little further and left, and just along the path was the stone seat set into the high hedge where she had stopped to shake out the little stone.

  Only there was no seat. She could hardly credit it, but she must have gone wrong somewhere. There could be a hidden alley that wasn’t marked, or perhaps they had taken a turn she hadn’t noticed coming in the first time. That stone in her shoe had been irritating her almost at once.

  She began retracing her steps to start again, but lichen covered the paths like a carpet and the rigidly controlled hedges were all the same height, and when she came into what should have been the way to the entrance/exit but wasn’t she stood there, shaking her head.

  She had managed to get lost in a quarter acre of hedges, and she had to find her own way out, because nobody would be looking for her. She hadn’t even found her bag, and she was facing the wrong direction now; the faint glow in the sky from the house was behind her.

  The darn place seemed booby-trapped, but the way out faced the house, so she would make for that, and soon she had to come on the path that would open on to the lawns.

  If she was not out in a few more minutes she would have to shout for help. Someone would hear her. The maze was near the house and the wind was only a murmur now. But a right idiot she would look calling up a rescue operation at this time of night, and she decided to keep moving.

  In the meantime her torch threw a comforting little searchlight, and although she was not enjoying herself much this was going to make Danny smile when she told him about it in the morning. She was in no way worried. Until she heard Nicolas Dargan shout, ‘Hello, there!’

  Then her reaction was the same panic that had yanked her off his bed. Her thumb jerked on the torch, switching it off, and she found herself ducking and scuttling, trying to keep out of sight.

  She hoped she was out of sight. Upstairs overlooked the maze, but in the dark it must be impossible to follow anyone unless they were showing a light. She had to get away before he came down, but why should he come down? Her torchlight had gone out guiltily as soon as he shouted, but what harm could a prowler do in a maze: vandalise the hedges?

  She kept her torch off, and then she heard him call again, nearer this time, ground level. While she was creeping along she could see the light from his torch flashing down the avenues and she knew she should be answering, ‘I’m here!’ but she couldn’t have croaked the words. And when his head suddenly appeared over the top of a hedge—he had to be standing on something, either that or he was eight foot high—she had to clamp her teeth on her bottom lip to stop herself shrieking with hysterical laughter.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asked.

  Good question! Clarry bit her lip hard and then she managed to say, ‘Trying to find my bag—I left it in here a little while ago.’

  ‘Stay where you are.’ He couldn’t know she had been dodging him, and now she had to stand and wait, although that crazy impulse to run was still almost irresistible.

  He came out at the end of the pathway, a dark shadow behind the beam of his torch. The moss underfoot muffled sound, but she knew he would move as quietly as a panther, and she took a dragging step to meet him.

  ‘What happened to your torch?’ he asked.

  ‘It went out.’ If he took it and tried it he would know she had switched it off. She dropped it into her pocket and bluffed, ‘It’s been on the blink.’

  ‘Where did you leave your bag?’

  ‘On a seat near the entrance. I thought I could just pick it up, but it isn’t that easy.’

  ‘Down here.’ She was glad he turned back to lead the way. The paths were narrow, he might have touched her in passing, and she shrank at the thought. As it was, his broad shoulders seemed to block out the way ahead when she followed him.

  They reached a seat, and there was her bag, and they were on the lawn in no time at all. She said, ‘Thank you. Goodnight.’

  ‘Goodnight, Clarry.’

  Only those who knew her well used her pet name. She was Clare to the rest. ‘You know who I am?’

  ‘Of course.’

  This was the last thing she had wanted, and how had it happened? ‘Is that why I’ve got this contract?’ she demanded. ‘Was giving me a break Nigel’s idea?’

  When he said no, she gasped.

  ‘It couldn’t be your conscience? You couldn’t feel you owed me?’

  ‘Owed you for what?’

  ‘For moving Nigel out of my life. You did do that?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘In his best interests, of course.’

  She made that heavily sarcastic, and he drawled, ‘Well, it doesn’t seem to have done you much harm.’

  Rage was blurring her sight and her speech. She said raggedly, ‘It could have finished me for all you cared. But you have a reputation for cutting away the dead wood, don’t you? And there was a time when that was all I was.’

  He had treated her heartlessly when she had been helpless, and now he said, ‘You look remarkably fit to me,’ and she could have clawed his arrogant face.

  She spoke through gritted teeth. ‘Oh, I’m fighting fit. Don’t worry, I’ve got steady hands again.’ That would have been hard to prove. If she had held out her hands anger would have had them shaking. ‘I’m not going to wreck your chimneypieces—I know how you feel about your property. Talking of your property, how is Nigel these days?’

  ‘Very well.’

  ‘Remember me to him. Tell him I think of him often.’ That was not true. She did not often think of Nigel, but it seemed a sharp line to walk away on.

  By the time she was climbing the final staircase she was furious with herself for losing her cool like that. It was bad luck that had kept her on a crashing collision course with Nicolas Dargan today, and that he knew she was the girl his cousin might have married if he had not ended everything between them.

  But he was in no doubt now how hostile and embittered she was, because she had just gone out of her way to spell that out for him, saying more than enough to bring down his formidable clout on her own stupid head.

  CHAPTER TWO

  CLARRY crept into her bed by the window and sat hunched and tense in the moonlight. Somewhere she had once come across an old country saying that
if moonlight fell on you while you slept it could steal your soul. She would rather have moonlight than darkness, but that meeting with Nicolas Dargan just now seemed to have sent her moon-mad.

  Until today she had not realised how traumatically he could affect her. If it had been Nigel here at King’s Lodge he would not have aroused anything like this storm of emotion.

  She had loved Nigel, they had had good times together, and if their paths crossed again she would feel a little sorrow, a little regret. But that would be all. Nigel might cast a shadow over her day, but coming face to face with Nicolas Dargan had hit her like a hurricane.

  Heaven knew what tomorrow would bring. Whether she could work here. Whether she would get the chance, because Nicolas Dargan would hardly be wanting somebody around who had just told him they hated his guts.

  She would have to wait and see, there was nothing else she could do. A headache was beginning to throb in her temples, but even if she did manage to sleep Nicolas Dargan would haunt her nightmares.

  She woke next morning without being able to remember if she had dreamt but with him already on her mind so vividly that she blinked as she opened her eyes, expecting to see him at the side of her bed looking down at her.

  Downstairs in the little parlour Danny was tucking into breakfast with a good appetite. Clarry needed coffee, but she found even a slice of toast hard to swallow.

  Yesterday Paul Burnley had shown them an old mirror in a wide frame of elaborately carved oak. The design was fruit and flowers and the workmanship was superb, but over the years the frame had been damaged badly in one place where a corner was broken off.

  Clarry had said they could repair it, and Danny had nodded sagely, because he was as skilled a woodcarver as the old masters, and she knew without him saying a word how much he wanted to carve a rose that would never die among the creations of craftsmen who had lived long ago.

  This morning she would have to tell him he might not get the chance, but while she was taking a deep breath to start, ‘Look, I’m sorry, but—’ Paul Burnley walked in, bright and breezy.

  ‘Morning, everybody. Everybody sleep well? Message for you.’ For Clarry. ‘Nicolas Dargan wants to see you.’ He was overdoing the breeziness, she thought. ‘Ten o’clock, if that’s convenient.’

  She would have liked to say, ‘It isn’t,’ but she knew that was a bogus civility. Ten o’clock, Nicolas Dargan had said, and ten o’clock she had better be there. Wherever. ‘Where?’ she asked.

  ‘There’s an office leading off the King’s Room.’ She hadn’t noticed, but the panelled walls could conceal doors.

  Danny had finished breakfast, and now he said, ‘Wait, shall I?’ but Clarry wanted him gone. She couldn’t forewarn him with the estate manager here, and she could well need time to get over what might be going to happen. Danny waiting for her when she came out of that interview could reduce her to the screaming abdabs.

  She said, ‘No need. It doesn’t really need both of us. You know what we’d be bringing back for work and I’ve got a bag packed in my room, if you’d pick that up for me.’

  Danny nodded and went, and she waved goodbye-for-now to the van with Paul Burnley standing beside her and asked him, ‘How did my name come up for this? We’re not that well known yet.’

  ‘You were recommended to me. You did some work on a house in Stratford.’

  So that was how it had happened, and she should be ringing and thanking the Mountjoys, because they had thought they were doing her a favour, putting prestigious and profitable work her way. It was not their fault their recommendation had brought her up against the man she would have paid good money to avoid.

  Walking back to the house she asked, ‘Have you seen Nicolas Dargan this morning?’

  ‘No. There was a note on my desk.’

  ‘So you’ve no idea why he wants to see me?’

  She had wondered if the agent might have been told there were doubts about the restoration team, but he said, ‘No, I haven’t, but he’s employing you and he likes to run a happy ship.’

  Clarry’s grin was a grimace. ‘A buccaneer running a happy ship! Why don’t you fly the Jolly Roger?’ When Paul Burnley looked blank she explained, ‘The pirates’ skull and crossbones flag,’ and he was suddenly on his dignity.

  ‘I know what the Jolly Roger was, and Nicolas Dargan is tough. But he’s a sound man, he looks after his own.’

  That he did. He had done his ruthless best for Nigel when Clarry was dumped as damaged goods.

  ‘But I’m not one of his own,’ she said. ‘He can send me packing if my face doesn’t fit,’ and she was rather touched when Paul Burnley tried to reassure her that he could not imagine anyone not being charmed by her face.

  She left him at the door of his office and went upstairs to collect the small camera that would have been the first tool she used if everything had gone according to plan. Then back into the parlour, where the coffee-pot yielded a final cup. Sitting quietly now, she decided that she did want this contract. If she kept calm and businesslike this morning Nicolas Dargan might let the arrangements stand. He might even agree that the Dargans owed her some small compensation.

  Just before ten o’clock she reached the door of the King’s Room. It was open, and through another door she glimpsed another room. But then she saw Nicolas Dargan and everything else went slightly out of focus.

  He was by the fireplace, wearing dark grey trousers and grey rollneck sweater. Just standing, waiting, but when she met his eyes she couldn’t turn her head away. ‘Good morning,’ he said, and her answering good morning was a mumble.

  ‘About this work you’re doing for me—do I have your assurance you won’t undermine the foundations?’

  He had to be laughing at her, and she thought, it would be a red letter day for me if I could undermine you. ‘I wouldn’t know how,’ she said, ‘I’m not into demolition.’

  He did laugh. Then he asked, ‘How large is your staff?’

  He couldn’t know much about her or he would have known that. She said, ‘There’s just the two of us. I hope to take on an apprentice before long, but for now it’s Daniel Hill. He’s very experienced, he does wonderful work. He’d retired, but when I started up on my own he joined me.’

  ‘He came out of retirement? How old is he?’

  He didn’t seem impressed, and she said defensively, ‘What’s his age matter? He’s exceptional, and his work’s as good as ever.’

  ‘I’d like to meet him.’ Danny wouldn’t appreciate being grilled by Nicolas Dargan.

  ‘You can’t right now,’ she said. ‘He’s gone to fetch what we’ll be needing, he’ll be back this afternoon. Your agent took us round yesterday and showed us what you wanted done. We can handle it.’

  After she had been so hostile last night he was bound to have qualms about her and, ironically, if he watched her at work he would make her so jittery she could be making mistakes. ‘Are you staying here?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re going to live in the house?’

  ‘That’s why I bought it,’ he explained.

  ‘Came as a job lot, did it, with the village?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘What are you starting on?’

  ‘What?’ That sounded as though the contract was still on. Nothing had been signed yet, but he had not thrown them out. ‘Oh, I should be doing this chimneypiece.’ She held up the little camera she had been clutching, trying to sound the expert she was. ‘But first we take photographs so that we have before-and-after records. Particularly where repairs as well as cleaning might be needed.’

  This fireplace had signs of neglect. She had been standing just inside the door, but now she stepped forward. ‘If you wouldn’t mind moving.’ Because he had not moved and he did obstruct quite an area.

  ‘Don’t say it,’ he said.

  She raised eyebrows. ‘Say what?’

  ‘That I could do with a repair job.’

  It was the last thing she was likely to say, and she
surprised herself when she asked, ‘With all your money, why don’t you get your nose fixed?’

  ‘It’s hardly worth it. It’s been like this for a long time.’

  ‘How did it happen?’ She felt that Nigel had told her, but she couldn’t quite remember.

  ‘I got into a fight. When I was younger and a long way from home.’

  ‘You lost?’ She hoped so, but she couldn’t imagine Nicolas Dargan on the losing side. He was a tough man in every way, hard muscles and a mind like a steel trap.

  ‘It evened out, and by the time this had settled down I’d got used to it. I’ve always looked like a heavyweight contender. This could be the nose I should have been born with.’

  There seemed hardly any family resemblance between the Dargan men. Nigel had a straight nose and a sensitive mouth. Nicolas’s mouth was sensual and Clarry would have described it as cruel. His eyes were much darker, and so piercing that it was all she could do to meet them with a level stare.

  ‘That streak in your hair,’ he said, and she put a hand to touch it, or hide it, and started to say,

  ‘Highlights are fashionable.’ Then she said, ‘It was the accident. It grew back this way.’

  ‘So we’ve got something in common,’ he remarked.

  ‘Like what?’ she said derisively.

  ‘We’re both flawed.’

  She had to laugh at that. ‘But mine’s a very small flaw, I could put mine right myself with a home dye. Yours needs structural attention.’

  The young woman walked in while they were laughing. Her smile was brilliant, and a little strained as if it had just been switched on. She kept looking at Nicolas Dargan and went straight to him as though there was no one else in the room.

  ‘This is Clare Rickard,’ he said.

  ‘I’m here to do the cleaning and restoration,’ explained Clarry.

  ‘And this is Fiona Stretton,’ said Nicolas.

  She had smooth pale blonde hair and she was wearing a beige suede trouser suit and a cream silk shirt. Her skin was velvety, her eyes were pale blue, and she was still smiling, showing small even teeth. ‘I saw you on the stairs,’ she said. ‘You seem to be making yourself at home.’