looked like a collapsed balloon. She was afraid he was going to burst into tears. ‘He had—a running flush in spades, beginning with the ace.’
There was a long silence, then Samma roused herself from the numbness which had descended on her.
She said, ‘You and Hugo Baxter have been playing poker together for a long time. Surely he’ll be prepared to give you time—come to some arrangement over the property …’
‘Baxter?’ he said hoarsely. ‘I’m not talking about Baxter. It was the Frenchman, Delacroix.’
This time, the silence was electric. Samma’s hand crept to her mouth.
She felt icy cold. ‘What—what are we going to do?’
‘Baxter will help us,’ he said rapidly. ‘He promised me he would. He—he doesn’t want to see us go under. He’s going to see Delacroix with me tomorrow to—work something out. He’s being—very generous.’
There was something about the way he said it—the way he didn’t meet her gaze.
She said, ‘Why is he being so—generous? What have you promised in return. Me?’
He looked self-righteous. ‘What do you take me for?’
‘Shall we try pimp?’ Samma said, and Clyde came out of his chair, roaring like a bull, his fists clenched. He met her calm, cold stare and subsided again.
‘We—we mustn’t quarrel,’ he muttered. ‘We have to stick by each other. Baxter—likes you, you know that. And he’s lonely. It wouldn’t hurt to be nice to him, that’s all he wants. Why, you could probably get him to marry you …’
‘Which would make everything all right, of course,’ she said bitterly. ‘Forget it, Clyde, the idea makes me sick to my stomach.’
‘Samma, don’t be hasty. What choice do we have? Unless Baxter supports me in some deal with Delacroix, we’ll be bankrupt—not even a roof over our heads.’
She rose to her feet. ‘This is your mess, Clyde,’ she said. ‘Don’t expect me to get you out of it.’
Back in her own room, she leaned against the closed door and began to tremble like a leaf. In spite of her defiant words, she had never felt so frightened, so helpless in her life. She seemed incapable of rational thought. She wanted to cry. She wanted to be sick. She wanted to lie down on the floor, and drum with her heels, and scream at the top of her voice.
All she seemed to see in front of her was Hugo Baxter’s sweating moon face, his gaze a trail of slime as it slid over her body.
No, she thought, pressing a convulsive fist against her lips. Oh God, no!
Clyde said there was no other choice, but there had to be. Had to …
‘A year out of your life.’ The words seemed to reverberate mockingly in her brain. ‘A year out of your life.’
She wrapped her arms round her body, shivering. No, that was unthinkable, too. She shouldn’t even be allowing such an idea to enter her mind.
And yet, what could she do—caught, as she was, between the devil and the deep sea once again? But surely that didn’t mean she had to sell herself to the devil?
She lay on the bed, staring into the darkness, her tired mind turning over the alternatives. She was blushing all over, as she realised exactly what she was contemplating.
But wasn’t she being rather melodramatic about the whole thing? She didn’t have to meekly submit to the fate being designed for her. She was no stranger, after all, to keeping men at arm’s length. Surely, she could manage to hold him off at least until they reached Allegra’s first port of call when, with luck, she could simply slip ashore and vanish, she thought feverishly. Her savings were meagre, but they would tide her over until she could find work, and save for her flight home.
She couldn’t let herself think too deeply about the inevitable problems. The important thing was to escape from Cristoforo—nothing mattered more than that—before she found herself trapped into a situation with Hugo Baxter that she could not evade. Because it was clear she couldn’t count on Clyde to assist her.
She began to plan. She would take the bare minimum from her scanty wardrobe—just what she could pack into her bicycle basket. And she’d leave a note for Clyde saying she was having a day on the beach to think. With luck, she would be long gone before he realised she was not coming back.
When it was daylight, she went over to the hotel, and carried out her usual early morning duties, warning the staff not to expect Clyde until later in the day. Then she collected a few belongings together, wrapped them in a towel to back up her beach story, and cycled down the quay.
Apart from the fishermen preparing to embark, there were few people about. Samma bit her lip as she approached Allegra’s gangplank. She wished she could have said goodbye to Mindy and the rest of her friends, but at the same time she was glad they weren’t around to witness what she was doing.
‘Can I help you, ma’mselle?’ At the top of the gangway, her path was blocked very definitely by a tall coloured man, with shoulders like a American quarter-back.
She squared her shoulders, and said, with a coolness she was far from feeling, ‘Would you tell Monsieur Delacroix that Samantha Briant would like to speak with him.’
The man gave her a narrow-eyed look. ‘Mist’ Roche ain’t seeing anyone right now, ma’mselle. You come back in an hour or two.’
In an hour or two, her courage might have deserted her, she thought. She said with equal firmness, ‘Please tell him I’m here, and I have some money for him.’
It was partly true. The small roll of bills representing her savings reposed in the pocket of her faded yellow sundress.
The man gave her another sceptical glance, and vanished. After a few minutes, he returned.
‘Come with me, please.’
The companionway and the passage to the saloon were only too familiar, but she was led further along to another door, standing slightly ajar. The man tapped lightly on the woodwork, said, ‘Your visitor, boss,’ and disappeared back the way he’d come, leaving Samma nervously on her own.
She pushed open the door, and walked in. It was a stateroom, the first glance told her, and furnished more luxuriously than any bedroom she’d ever been in on dry land.
And in the sole berth—as wide as any double bed—was Roche Delacroix, propped up against pillows, a scatter of papers across the sheet which barely covered the lower half of his body, a tray of coffee and fruit on the fitment beside him.
Samma took a step backwards. She said nervously, ‘I’m sorry—I didn’t realise. I’ll wait outside until you’re dressed.’
‘Then you will wait for some considerable time.’ He didn’t even look at her. His attention was fixed frowningly on the document he was scanning. ‘Sit down.’
Samma perched resentfully on the edge of a thickly padded armchair. Its silky upholstery matched the other drapes in the room, she noticed. She wasn’t passionately
