the vineyard without that condition?’
‘And what would you have done then?’
Ryan shrugged. ‘I – I don’t know.’
Alain turned to face her. ‘Shall I tell you? You would have sold it. Without ever coming here to see it for yourself.’
‘You don’t know that!’ she exclaimed.
‘Don’t I?’ His lips curled. ‘I think I do. I think your father knew you were half your mother’s daughter, after all.’
‘Don’t you dare slander my mother!’
‘Why not? Don’t you think she treated your father abominably?’
Ryan’s breathing was swift and shallow. ‘You know nothing about it.’
‘Don’t I?’ he mocked again. ‘I know what your father told me. He was a sick man before he returned to France.’
Ryan stared at him unbelievingly. ‘Wh-what are you saying?’
‘Don’t you know? Didn’t your mother tell you? Your father developed a heart condition almost two years before he left England.’
‘No!’
‘It’s the truth. And the climate did not help. Wet summers, cold winters; he was a prey to bronchial complaints, complaints which weakened the muscles of his heart.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
Ryan couldn’t allow herself to believe him. Her mother could not have permitted her father, a sick man, to return to France alone knowing that he might die at any time!
Alain hunched his shoulders. ‘Nevertheless, it is the truth,’ he asserted firmly. ‘I am sorry if it destroys the image you have of your mother, but quite frankly your father’s last wishes are all that concern me.’
Ryan sought one of the wooden chairs that flanked the kitchen table, and sat down rather heavily. Her legs no longer felt strong enough to support her, and the sickness she had felt turned to a dull throbbing in her temples. Could it be true? Could it be proved? Surely Alain de Beaunes would not risk telling her something like this knowing that her father’s doctor could refute it if it was not true.
She looked up at him unsteadily, her pale cheeks and hollowed eyes eloquent of the shock she had suffered. ‘I – I never knew.’
‘I believe you.’ His tone was less aggressive, but without sympathy.
Ryan shook her head helplessly. ‘How – how could she?’
‘That’s what I asked myself, many times.’
Ryan pressed her palms together. ‘I – I need time to think.’
‘About what?’
She glanced up at him piteously. ‘You know about what.’
He shrugged and turned away. ‘I have things to do. Life goes on, even in the face of death. You’ll let me know your decision, of course.’ Sarcasm had crept in to his tones.
Ryan closed her eyes against the sight of him. Then she opened them again and said: ‘I – I have to do it, don’t I?’
‘That’s for you to decide.’
‘No, it’s not.’ She gazed at him desperately. ‘What – what did you mean by – by a marriage of convenience?’
‘Exactly what it says. I have no interest in a child, mademoiselle.’
Her cheeks burned. ‘I’m not a child, or the situation would not arise.’
‘Maybe not in years, but in experience …’
‘And – and are you experienced, monsieur?’
She didn’t know what made her ask the question, except that she sensed he would have no small knowledge of her sex. He regarded her disconcertingly for a while, and then said: ‘As much as any man who has already had one wife.’
Ryan gasped. ‘You – you have a wife, monsieur?’
‘I had,’ he corrected expressionlessly. ‘My wife died almost ten years ago.’
‘Almost ten years ago!’ Ryan found it hard to take in. Ten years ago she had been a child …
‘I am forty years of age, mademoiselle. Old enough to be your father, I admit. Perhaps you had better regard our relationship in that light. With luck, you could be a widow before you are my age.’
Ryan sucked in her breath on a sob. ‘Don’t say such things!’
‘No?’ He moved his shoulders indifferently. ‘Perhaps not. Perhaps I will live my three score years and ten. Perhaps even a little more. Who knows? A life sentence, mademoiselle, is it not? I am sorry, but I did not make the rules. Your father did that.’
RYAN’S room was at the head of the twisting flight of stairs which led to the upper reaches of the house. It was not a large room and towards the eaves the ceiling sloped a little, but it was a comfortable room and when she had first seen it, Ryan had been delighted with it. The uneven floorboards were covered with fluffy wool rugs, the bed-spread was a rich folkweave, and the curtains were patterned with sprigs of lilac. If the furniture – the iron-posted bedstead, the heavy tallboy, the mahogany wardrobe and dressing table, were a little outdated, they nevertheless shone from frequent polishings, and the room smelt sweetly of freshly laundered sheets and bees-wax.
On the morning following her father’s funeral, Ryan stood by the window of her room, looking down the sweeping length of the valley. She could see the river, the terraced hillside, the houses huddled at its base, the reaching spire of the church of St. Augustine, and the distant mountains where the snow could always find a resting place. In summer when the snows receded to the high plateau, the goatherds sought the lush pastures that had been hidden all winter long, and the air echoed with the sound of goat bells, but now it was almost time for the snow to come again and Ryan shivered at the prospect.
Still, the rain had departed and the morning was fresh and clear, if a little chill. Ryan had been dressed since the first grey fingers of light probed her bedroom curtains, but she had delayed the moment of going downstairs and confronting Alain de Beaunes. The evening before had a curiously unreal quality about it, and although she had slept almost as soon as her head touched the pillow, she had been awake early, lying staring into the darkness, trying not to feel afraid of the future.
But it was impossible for her not to do so. The idea of marrying a man she had known little more than a week was a terrifying prospect, particularly as that man inspired no confidence inside her. He was so much older, so much more experienced, so big and powerful, so much a man in every sense of the word. She had seen the broad strength of his shoulders, the hair-covered skin of his chest which narrowed to a flat stomach, the muscles bulging against the taut cloth which covered his thighs; how could she believe him when he
