Daughters of the Governor Page 2

  “I should think,” Kathy answered, recalling her first impression of the man she had likened to a buccaneer, “that he is quite capable of looking out for himself, Captain Sagah.”

  “Oh, he is. There is no weakness in Desmond Conroy. The Pathans he led on the Frontier and the tribesmen he led them against had a common nickname for him — they called him ‘The Steel One’, which is about the highest compliment they could pay to a European. And he lived up to it, I give you my word, Miss Gregson.”

  “You admire him, don’t you?” Kathy suggested. Lal Sagah smiled. “Yes, I do, very much—in spite of the fact that he insists on calling me Willy! Perhaps”—his tone was frankly envious—“because he is all the things which I am not. It is not unusual for a man to admire his opposite —or for a woman also, if it comes to that, don’t you agree?”

  “I don’t know,” Kathy demurred. Her brows came together. Perhaps it wasn’t. She wondered if Desmond Conroy had anyone he cared for deeply and, as if in answer to her unspoken thoughts, Lal Sagah said reflectively, “Desmond has a young step-brother who is also in the regiment and to whom he is very devoted—Robin Conroy. I don’t think you have met him yet, they have both been on leave. You will see him tonight.”

  “Tonight? But—” An outburst of clapping from the line of chairs where the spectators sat drew Kathy’s attention once more to the game and she broke off. “Oh, what’s happened? I missed it, I wasn’t looking.”

  “His Highness,” Lal Sagah told her, “has scored. Mirapur have broken their duck and I see your father applauding with great courtesy, Miss Gregson. Which reminds me”—he looked at his watch and heaved a regretful sigh—“I’m afraid I shall have to leave you soon and return to Government House before the game ends. There is the Ball tonight and I have to arrange the seating at dinner.”

  “Oh, dear, I’d forgotten about tonight.” Kathy’s face fell, and seeing it, he stared at her in astonishment. “Surely you are looking forward to the Ball, Miss Gregson? You dance, if I may say so, very beautifully and with much grace. I have seen you. Don’t you enjoy it?”

  “I enjoy dancing. It’s the dinner party beforehand that I dread. I’m always put beside people I haven’t anything to say to, colonels and . . .” She flushed. “Well, colonels and senior political officers. I forget their names and—oh, I don’t know, I simply dread it.”

  Lal Sagah jumped to his feet. “If that is all, then you may safely leave the matter in my hands—I understand how you feel and I sympathize deeply. On previous occasions it has been Francis Cunningham who has been responsible for the table platings, but tonight it is I who am to do it. I will see that you are given at least one dinner partner whose conversation you will enjoy. You may trust me, Miss Gregson, I promise you.”

  What would Harriet say, Kathy wondered. Harriet would have His Highness on her right hand. . . . “I don’t think,” she objected, “honestly, Captain Sagah, I don’t think you ought to interfere. Francis has been A.D.C. for a long time, he knows what my father wants, what he expects of me and——”

  “Does anyone ask you what you want, Miss Gregson?”

  “Well, no.” Francis Cunningham certainly didn’t, Kathy reflected. He only worried about seniority and what was correct, and it had probably never occurred to him that, at eighteen, she found senior political officers and battalion commanders rather terrifying company. Or perhaps he thought that it was time she learnt to make conversation with them, so that she might relieve Harriet occasionally. Francis, like Andrew Lyle, was, in his stolid way, also a great admirer of her sister Harriet. . . . “Captain Sagah, you——”

  But Lal Sagah, for once, wasn’t listening to her. His dark eyes were fixed on three galloping figures just below them and he was suddenly as tense as a coiled spring. Kathy’s gaze followed his and she, too, fell silent.

  Desmond Conroy, riding a bay pony now, was in pursuit of a long pass from Patrick and, on either side of him, so close that their knees were touching, two of the Mirapur players were racing to cut him off. One of these was the Raja himself, his dark, bearded face grimly set under the dazzling white pugaree, his mouth a tight, hard line. This was a game, Kathy reminded herself as they thundered past her—a game, nothing more, although all three of them seemed momentarily to have lost sight of the fact. They were certainly not playing a game now.

  Desmond Conroy was smiling, his eyes narrowed slits of steely blue. . . . The Steel One, as both his Pathan troopers and his enemies had dubbed him. The nickname was at this moment a very apt one. She saw his hand move on his pony’s neck, saw the bay change legs and alter direction. The next second, so swiftly and so unexpectedly that she couldn’t have described exactly what had happened, he was in front, clear of the other two, his stick raised to make contact with the flying white speck that was the ball Patrick had passed to him.

  It rose, to skim cleanly between the goalposts as the Raja’s pony, checked too harshly, stumbled and, receiving a glancing blow on the quarters from the Mirapur Number Three, went down in a flurry of flailing hoofs, its rider a splash of crumpled white somewhere beneath it.

  Kathy heard Lal Sagah let out his breath in a long, horrified gasp, and then she was running blindly after him, on to the field, towards the still white figure lying beside the prostrate pony. Out of the tail of her eye she saw Desmond Conroy bring his pony to a halt. He sat where he was, motionless, looking back, his smile abruptly fading, but a fugitive gleam of triumph still lighting his eyes.

  The Raja picked himself up before any one of them could reach him. There was a dazed expression on his face, but he shook his head to Lal Sagah’s anxious enquiries and went over, limping a little, to the pony which, by this time, was making an effort to struggle to its feet. He spoke to it gently, as if to a child, and the animal nuzzled him as his fingers passed questingly over each limb in turn, seeking for any sign of injury.

  Finding none, he straightened himself painfully, motioning to his syce to bring him a fresh mount.

  “There is no harm done. We will continue the game.” His voice was flat, devoid of feeling, but Kathy sensed that he was making a great effort to control it. He saw her and smiled. “I gave you a fright, Miss Gregson? I am sorry. Tell His Excellency for me, will you, please, that I am quite unscathed. Thank you.”

  The other players gathered round him, Patrick dismounting from his horse, but the Raja waved them away. His eyes met Desmond Conroy’s across the intervening distance and his smile widened. Brusquely, he cut short the younger man’s apologies. “Come, what is a toss, after all? You are a worthy opponent, Captain Conroy, and I am anxious to resume our tussle. Let us not waste time saying we are sorry or the light will go before we have finished our game.” He took the reins of the fresh pony his syce had brought him and lifted an immaculately booted leg. The syce bent, palm extended, and swung him into the saddle.

  The players cantered off, leaving Kathy alone with Lal Sagah. The game had restarted long before they had skirted the field, and Kathy, seeing that her father was absorbed in watching it, didn’t bother him with the Raja’s message. Harriet, too, was deep in conversation and didn’t notice her either so, stifling a sigh, she went to collect her pony. She had suddenly lost all interest in the outcome of the game and, in any case, it was time she returned to Government House to bath and change preparatory to the evening’s festivities. The others had come by car, but she had half an hour’s ride in front of her.

  She jogged slowly up the steep hill road, only dimly conscious of her surroundings. Before her half-closed eyes floated tantalizingly the image of Desmond Conroy’s tanned, smiling face. She saw it as it had been an instant after the Raja’s fall and, catching again that swift gleam of triumph she had glimpsed in his blue eyes, Kathy shivered involuntarily. And, try as she might to banish it during the brief ride back, the memory lingered in her mind and she was suddenly, inexplicably afraid.

  CHAPTER II

  KATHY
had just finished dressing when Harriet came into her room. Her sister looked very lovely, Kathy thought with a twinge of envy, calm and serene and poised, completely mistress of herself. She wore a charming dress of grey taffeta which rustled as she walked gracefully across the room. It was low-cut to display to advantage the creamy beauty of her neck and shoulders, and Harriet had added a touch of colour to relieve it in the wrap of soft rose-coloured tulle and the tiny, brilliant-encrusted evening bag she carried in her left hand. Her other hand caressed the single crimson rose she wore pinned to the front of her dress, a lovely rose, fresh—picked and not quite out.

  Harriet was only seven years her senior and yet, looking at her now, Kathy felt absurdly as if she were a child again and Harriet her mother, come to bid her goodnight before leaving for some grownup function which she herself was too young to attend. But alas for such illusions: her sister’s first words shattered the brittle dream.

  “Kathy darling, aren’t you ready yet? Goodness, child, bestir yourself—it’s nearly eight, you know, and Daddy does so hate it if we’re late. It holds up everything.” She spoke kindly, without impatience, but Kathy’s cheeks burned with shame.

  “I’m sorry, Harriet. I’m almost ready. Only my hair just won’t look right, I can’t think why. Ayah’s tried and I’ve tried, but you can see for yourself how awful it looks.”

  Kathy gestured to the mirror helplessly.

  “Let me try, then,” Harriet offered. She held out her hand for the hairbrush. The ayah they shared, who had been Kathy’s own ayah when she was a baby, gave it to her and beamed at them both, her faded old eyes bright with sudden tears. She murmured something in her own tongue which Kathy didn’t catch and then shuffled away, bare feet padding across the polished floor and the anklets she wore making a small, musical jingle as she walked.

  “What did she say?” Kathy asked, as Harriet plied the brush with deft gentleness.

  “Only that I look like Mother. Lift your head, will you, Kath? I can’t see what I’m doing.”

  Kathy obeyed. “You do,” she said eagerly, “Harriet, you do look awfully like her, you know. I thought so when you came in. Perhaps it’s that dress—Mother always loved grey, didn’t she?”

  “Yes, I think she did,” Harriet agreed. She brushed more vigorously. Kathy saw the reflection of her face in the mirror, saw that she had paled. “Don’t you want to look like her, Harriet?” she questioned, surprised. “Aren’t you glad you do? Mother was beautiful.”

  “Yes,” Harriet agreed briefly, “I know she was. Now then, how’s that? Any better, do you think?”

  Kathy studied her reflection critically, seeing no beauty in her own small, high-boned face. She was dark, like her father and Patrick, and her eyes were smoke-grey, like theirs. It was only Harriet who had inherited their mother’s exquisite, pink and white colouring, and her hair, growing in soft tendrils about her face, shone in the light, as smooth and bright and delicate as spun gold.

  “Well?” Harriet prompted, a trifle impatient now. She looked at her watch. “We really ought to go down. It’s five to eight.”

  Kathy sighed. Harriet’s skilful brushing had certainly improved her hair, though it still didn’t look as she wished it would. It was too thick and long to be manageable. She herself wanted to have it cut quite short, as so many girls wore their hair nowadays, but her father was old-fashioned and wouldn’t hear of it.

  “I suppose it’s all right,” she said doubtfully.

  “Of course it is.” Harriet inserted the last hairpin and smiled at her in the mirror. “You look sweet, Kath. It suits you long, you know, honestly it does. Now do come on, we simply must be downstairs before the Raja appears. Francis and Lal Sagah will look after the drinks, of course, but could you see that Mohammed Bux offers everyone a cigarette? He’s convinced, for some reason best known to himself, that memsahibs don’t smoke. I’ve told him till I’m tired that they do, but it never seems to penetrate. And last night I saw Mrs Randall smoking her own. . . .” Still talking, she slipped Kathy’s wrap about her slim shoulders and urged her to the door.

  “Wait,” Kathy pleaded, seized with last-minute panic, “my bag. I don’t know where on earth I put it. And I haven’t got a handkerchief.”

  The ayah found her bag, Harriet lent her a handkerchief and then there was no excuse. Kathy braced herself.

  “All right,” she said, “I’m ready, Harriet. I’m frightfully sorry if I’ve kept you waiting.”

  “It doesn’t matter, darling, I always keep my watch a few minutes fast,” Harriet confessed. She put an arm on her sister’s. “Why, Kathy, you’re trembling! Do you really find these parties so hard to cope with?”

  “Yes.” Tears misted Kathy’s eyes. “I hate them.”

  “Silly little goose! You mustn’t let it worry you so much. The dinner party can’t last for ever and the Ball is going to be fun, you’ll have a lovely time. And lots of extremely attractive young men who’ll be longing to dance with you.”

  “I don’t mind the young men, I can talk to them. It’s the old ones, the frightfully senior, important ones. Oh, Harriet”—Kathy halted and turned to face her sister—“Colonel Randall. This morning I——”

  “Darling, I heard all about it,” Harriet assured her consolingly. Her smile was tolerantly sympathetic. “Colonel Randall wasn’t in the least offended—in fact he was most amused. He said you’d put him properly in his place!”

  “I was afraid he’d be annoyed.”

  “Well, he wasn’t. Was that why you weren’t at tea, why you were hiding in the trees when the polo was on?”

  “You saw me?” The guilty colour rose in waves to Kathy’s cheeks.

  “Oh, Kath!” Harriet was laughing, she wasn’t angry or reproachful, as Kathy had feared she would be. “Of course I saw you, silly. Even if I hadn’t spotted you earlier—which I did—I’d have seen you when you rushed on to the field after the Raja’s pony came down.”

  She linked her arm in Kathy’s and they started to descend the long flight of marble stairs leading to the great, imposing entrance hall with its glittering chandeliers. Chuprassis in scarlet and gold and some of the household servants in white, with scarlet sashes, were moving about below them, waiting for the Governor’s guests to arrive, and Kathy caught a glimpse of Lal Sagah, magnificently uniformed, standing in the doorway of the anteroom in which they would be received.

  Of her father there was, of course, as yet no sign. He came only when all his guests were assembled, and was announced, like royalty, as the representative of His Majesty King George. Kathy still found it strange that on such occasions she must curtsey to him, although it always gave her an odd little thrill to do so.

  She glanced at Harriet. “The Raja wasn’t hurt, was he? Not badly, I mean?”

  Harriet sighed. “He won’t admit to being hurt at all, but I think it shook him a good deal—he’s not young, you know, and he fell with the pony on top of him. My heart was in my mouth when I saw him flying over its head. It was quite unpardonable of Desmond Conroy to bring him down like that—Daddy was simply furious about it.”

  “But it was an accident,” Kathy said, and hesitated, seeing her sister’s brows come together. “Harriet . . . wasn’t it? Surely he didn’t bring the Raja down deliberately? No one would do a thing like that on—on purpose, would they?”

  Again, almost against her will, she had a swift mental vision of Desmond Conroy’s face, the bright, triumphant blue eyes, the smile, the jutting, aggressive chin. She heard his voice, indifferent and faintly mocking, as if it were coming from beside her, and she waited, suddenly anxious, for her sister’s answer to her question.

  “I don’t know,” Harriet said slowly. She was still frowning. “Desmond Conroy is capable of anything, Kathy. So, if it comes to that, is His Highness, of course.” She had lowered her voice and her frown was frankly worried. “Both the Conroys are coming to dinn
er tonight which, in the circumstances, is a pity. But it’s too late to do anything about it now, I suppose. Oh, well”—the frown vanished, to be replaced with her normal, charming, serene smile—“that can’t be helped. Come on, we’ve wasted enough time talking. Don’t forget about the cigarettes, will you? And if you’re stuck for a dinner-table topic—talk about Paris. You know it better than anyone else is likely to—but keep off Hitler and the European situation if you can.”

  “All right,” Kathy promised, trying to take in this sage advice. “Harriet, do you know Desmond Conroy well?”

  It was Harriet’s turn to hesitate. “I know him,” she answered finally, and there was an odd note in her voice which puzzled Kathy, who glanced up at her in swift enquiry. Harriet’s lovely face was expressionless, but her eyes, as they met Kathy’s, were wary, her smile no longer serene. “Why do you ask?”

  “Only because we were talking about him. And because I was introduced to him this afternoon.”

  This time Harriet’s hesitation was barely perceptible. She said coldly, “He isn’t at all your type, Kath. But his brother Robin is a dear. And he’s a friend of Patrick’s. I must see that you meet him and—oh, there is Patrick.” She released Kathy’s arm. “I’ve got a message for him from Daddy. Behave yourself, won’t you?” Her parting smile was distrait as she hurried after Patrick.

  Left alone, Kathy went reluctantly into the anteroom to be met by a harassed Francis. Her father’s senior A.D.C. was a short, broad-shouldered young man who took his duties very seriously. His expression was habitually glum and he had a nervous manner which always increased Kathy’s shyness. But he was undeniably efficient and an excellent organizer, and before she had time to protest he had enlisted her help and kept her so busy, from the moment the first guest arrived, that she had scarcely a moment in which to draw breath, still less to think over all that Harriet had said to her.