chair and jerked her into his arms, pressing his wet mouth to hers. Charlotte could still shudder at the remembrance of that revolting embrace, and she wondered again how she had succeeded in escaping from him. He was a strong man—but he had been drinking, and she fought herself free with all the power of her healthy young body. She went straight to Logan, of course, and there, in his hotel room, in the heat of indignation and the passion which always flared between them, he made love to her.
Afterwards, she had been shocked and tearful, drained of all emotion, and then when Logan would have comforted her, a call had come in from the university and he had gone off to see the principal without even saying goodbye. Charlotte waited, but as time passed she grew cold and frightened, and eventually she returned to High Clere.
The following day Matthew apologised for his behaviour, and ever afterwards she could never remember him imbibing too freely. On the contrary, in the eleven years they were married he seldom took more than a glass of wine with his dinner.
Charlotte waited for Logan to contact her, and when he didn’t she rang his hotel, only to be told he had checked out the morning after … after …
Time ran together after that. Disillusioned and unhappy, she was horrified when she discovered the results of her recklessness. But Matthew had been surprisingly sympathetic. He rang the university on her behalf and elicited the information that Mr Kennedy had returned to Rio de Janeiro some weeks previously. Charlotte remembered how distraite she had felt not knowing what to do, where to turn, contemplating the possibilities of abortion, all the emotional trauma of an unwanted pregnancy.
Then Matthew had renewed his offer of marriage, with the proviso that she could keep her own room, that things would go on exactly as before. Even so, she had been reluctant to accept. Deep inside her, she had not been able to rid herself of the feeling that perhaps there was some explanation, that perhaps Logan would come back. But he didn’t, and as the days and weeks went by, her hopes dwindled and died.
So she married Matthew, as much for his sake as hers, although his family would never accept that. But he had so much more to lose than she did by a scandal, and she knew there was some truth in his assertion that people would suspect that he was responsible.
When Robert was first born, Matthew seemed delighted to have a son, and those early years were happier than even Charlotte could have imagined. But as Robert got older, things changed. Perhaps it was his obvious lack of resemblance to Matthew, or the fact that he got more pleasure out of outdoor pursuits than showing an interest in his father’s stores. Or maybe it was simply that like fatigue eating into metal, his brother and sister-in-law’s maliciousness got through to him. Whatever it was, Matthew began picking on the boy, chastising him at every opportunity, until Robert himself rebelled and turned on his father.
Until then, Robert had accepted Matthew as his father without inquiry, but suddenly came a spate of questions about how Charlotte came to marry a man so much older than she was, and why when all the other boys at school had young, athletic fathers, his was already an old man.
She parried his questions as best she could, not wanting to make him any more insecure than he already was, but once again it was Matthew who precipitated disaster, throwing his mother’s wanton behaviour at him, insinuating that she didn’t really know who his father was, destroying for ever any lingering trace of affection Robert might have felt for him.
Whether the bitterness which had corroded his soul was responsible, Charlotte did not know, but two days later Matthew had a heart attack from which he never fully recovered, and six months later he was dead.
Even so she would not have believed he could be so vindictive. The house, the property he owned, all his securities and the interest he had in the Derby stores went to his brother and his family, while Charlotte was left with a little over three hundred pounds in cash, and the small amount of jewellery she possessed.
Naturally, Malcolm and Elizabeth were jubilant. It was nothing less than she deserved, they said, and Charlotte had suffered their taunts in silence. Mr Lewis, Matthew’s solicitor, was obviously more sensitive, however, and a few days after the funeral he had come to her with this offer of employment as nursemaid to the small son and daughter of a Madame Fabergé, whose husband was living and working on San Cristobal in the Virgin Islands.
Charlotte had her doubts at first. It was a tremendous step to take, leaving the country to live on a remote Caribbean island with people she had not even met. But Mr Lewis’s persuasions and Robert’s enthusiasm, allied to her own desire to put both of them out of reach of the influence of Matthew’s relatives, eventually swayed the balance. So far, Robert had not questioned her about his real father, but she knew it was only a matter of time before he would want to know. To tell him his father had been a student was not enough, and perhaps, away from England, she could think of some acceptable substitute.
The terms of her employment seemed reasonable: she was to travel out to San Cristobal for a month’s trial, at the end of which time both parties would have the option to terminate the contract. Hours of work would be agreed between her employer and herself, and she and Robert would live independently in their own bungalow, a few yards from the Fabergé house. Charlotte had had to admit it sounded ideal, except that Robert would not receive the standard of schooling to which he was accustomed. Before Matthew’s death he had been attending a small preparatory school, not far from their home in Richmond, but Charlotte had known that sooner or later she would have to remove him from there. She didn’t think Robert would object. He was an easy-going boy, and had the capacity to adapt to circumstances. Which was just as well, she thought wryly.
‘Do you think there are sharks out there?’
Robert’s eager question diverted Charlotte, and she determined to put all thoughts of Matthew, and the Derbys, out of her mind.
‘Well, I expect there are sharks,’ she conceded doubtfully, realising this was something else she had not considered. ‘But I don’t suppose it’s dangerous to swim or anything like that.’
‘Mmm. Pity,’ her son remarked disappointedly, and she gasped. ‘Robert!’
‘Well…’ His grin was rueful, and the memories she had succeeded in stifling moments before came flooding back. Robert’s resemblance to his father might not be too obvious yet, but his sense of humour was purely Logan’s—that, and his darkness, the sallow cast of his skin after spending too long in northern climes, and the angular leanness of his body which would later acquire the muscular hardness of his father’s. ‘That would be really something,’ he added. ‘Seeing a shark!’
‘It’s something I can do well without,’ retorted Charlotte, her tone sharpened by emotion.
‘Oh, Mum!’
‘Besides,’ she went on, ‘if—and I emphasise the word if—you do get the opportunity to go swimming, I shall expect you to remain within your depth.’
‘Seventy per cent of shark attacks on bathers occur in two to three feet of water,’ Robert observed casually.
‘My God!’ Charlotte stared at him aghast.
Robert shrugged. ‘It’s true.’
‘Did you have to tell me that?’
His eyes teased hers. ‘I thought you’d want to know.’
‘Where did you get this information?’
‘From an encyclopaedia. When that film faws was showing, we did this project—–’
‘Yes,
