HF - 05 - Sunset (26 page)

'It'll be easy enough,' Billy said. 'We can look after it at the office. Billy Hilton. William Hilton. There has never been a William Hilton. It has a ring to it.'

'Yes, well
...'
Walter Reynolds still looked as if he'd been sandbagged. 'You do understand that Billy, or whoever you married, Meg, can only be your attorney until you are twenty-one.' He was looking at his son. 'You do not inherit until then, and I have no power, in fact, I am specifically forbidden by the terms of your father's will to assign the ownership of the plantation or even to admit a second party to joint ownership.'

'I don't mind being Meg's attorney for three years, Father,' Billy said.

'And it's only three years, Uncle Walt,' Meg said. 'Then I can do as I like.'

'Yes, well
...'
Walter Reynolds was frowning, having noted the ambiguity of her words.

'Well,' Helen said brightly. 'I'm sure there is a lot to be done
...'

'Oriole,' Meg said, determined to leave nothing to chance. 'I don't want to see her, Aunt Helen. Really and truly.'

'Not see her? But my dear child
...'

'She is almost certainly on her way now,' Meg said. 'And even if our engagement is announced by the time she arrives, she will be quite impossible.' She gave Billy's hand another squeeze. 'I told her I wanted to marry Billy, when she was trying to get me engaged to some ghastly Englishman, and she wouldn't have it.'

'Bless my soul,' Walter Reynolds remarked. 'What could she have against Billy?'

'She had some very odd ideas,' Helen agreed.

'So I don't want her talking at me, bullying me, badgering me,' Meg said. 'I know she'll try. I know it.'

'She won't have the chance,' Walter Reynolds said. 'You may leave that to me. Bless my soul. So much to be done. The reception
...'

'Will be held at the Great House,' Meg said.

'Eh?
But...'

'We have six months,' Meg said. 'If the women started now, they could have that place entirely habitable in six weeks. And we
are
going to live there, eh, Billy?'

Again the squeeze. But Billy seemed to have at last woken up to the realization of just what had happened.

'Oh, indeed we are,' he said. 'Hiltons don't live in bungalows.'

'My word,' Walter Reynolds said.

'I think that
is
an excellent idea, Walt,' Helen said. 'It is a terrible shame, having that great
...
house, just sitting there, mouldering.'

Meg wondered if she had baulked on the word mausoleum.

'Oh, indeed,' Walter Reynolds said. 'Mind you, it will cost a great deal.'

'Surely we can spend a little on Meg Hilton's wedding, Walt,' Helen said.

'Oh, yes, yes indeed. I suppose we can. So much to be done. My word
...'
He peered
at
his hunter. 'How late
it
is. My word. We must be getting back to town. My word.'

Meg wondered if he was suffering from shock.

'Well
...'
Billy turned to face her, and held her other hand. 'Well
...
I do love you, Meggie. So very much.'

'And I love you, Billy,' she promised herself, and kissed him on the mouth. Perhaps he hadn't expected that; his lips never parted.

'I suppose I had better kis
s you too, Meg,' Walter Rey
nolds said, 'as I am to be your father-in-law. My word. If only Patricia had lived for this day.'

Meg stood on the front porch and waved them out of sight with her handkerchief. Don't stop to think, she kept telling herself. It is a decision, an essential decision, to gain your freedom, and to guarantee that you keep your freedom. To make Meg Hilton a real human being, for the first time. To guarantee the future, and the future prosperity, of Hilltop.

As for Billy, he loved, and there was sufficient for the moment. All things were possible, where a man loved.

'Meg
’
Helen threw an arm round her shoulders and gave her a squeeze. 'I am so happy for you, Meg. So very happy.'

'Thank you, Aunt Helen. I am so very happy for myself.' Meg allowed herself to be escorted inside.

'But there is, really, so very much to be done,' Helen said. 'Six months will prove a very short while. We will go into town tomorrow and arrange for a dressmaker
...
I know the very woman, not cheap, mind, but the best. And then we shall have to discuss the catering and
...'

'And we shall have to arrange for a start to be made on cleaning up the Great House.'

'Of course, and we shall have
...'
She gazed at Meg with her mouth open. 'But first of all, we have to choose the date.'

'As soon as possible,' Meg said. 'I know, we could be married on Billy's twenty-first birthday.'

'Oh, really, Meg, that would cause a fuss, and there is going
to
be enough of a fuss already. Any way, whether or not depends, well, on your dates.'

'My dates?'

'Well, your period. You can't possibly go on a honeymoon if your period is about to occur. We shall have to work
it
out, as exactly as we can. Now, when was your last ?' She sat at her desk with a pencil poised over a sheet of paper.

While Meg stared at her in total consternation. She had just remembered that she had not menstruated at all in the three weeks since leaving England, and not for two weeks before that.

CHAPTER NINE

THE WIFE

'AMAZING,' said Mrs Mottram.

'Scandalous, you mean,' said Mrs Holroyd.

Their voices were lost in the general hum of whispers, and in any event they were seated at the very back of the huge withdrawing room.

'Mind you,' said Mrs Mottram, 'it is quite exciting, at last getting inside here. Do you know, my grandmother used to tell me stories of entertainments here when Richard Hilton the Elder was alive.'

'Scandalous,' Mrs Holroyd said. 'He had a French wife.'

'That's right, a pretty little thing called Cartarette. Do you know, according to my grandmother, he won her as a slave while fighting for the niggers in Haiti.'

'Scandalous,' said Mrs Holroyd.

'But of course, all the Hiltons were like that.'

'Are like that,' Mrs Holroyd pointed out. 'Scandalous.'

'Oh, indeed. And now, to get married within two months of her father's death. Do you know, they were saying she only waited for the house to be redecorated. It is a magnificent place, isn't it?'

'Scandalous,' said Mrs Holroyd. 'Built with pirate money. That's all the Hiltons were in the beginning, you know. Pirates.'

'Buccaneers,' Mrs Mottram said thoughtfully. As a shipping agent her husband handled a good deal of Hilltop business.

'Scandalous,' Mrs Holroyd observed. 'And wh
at about
this cousin? Coming all the way from England, and returning on the very next boat? Do you know, my housekeeper tells me she and Margaret Hilton were heard shouting at each other in her hotel room.'

'Well, I'm not surprised. A Hilton, marrying a Reynolds? Even if he has changed his name. The family must be
...
well, horrified.'

'Scandalized,' said Mrs Holroyd. 'And now they say she is going to manage Hilltop herself. A chit of a girl, only just eighteen years old. Quite scandalous.'

'Sssssh,' Mrs Mottram suggested, as the music began, played on the Hilton grand piano. Billy and his best man, an architect named Roger Piatt, were on their feet, half facing the archway to the hall, through which Meg could see them as she reached the foot of the stairs and prepared to turn into the drawing room. She stopped, both because she was surrounded by the maids and men servants, dressed in their best, the men in white with brass buttons, the women with freshly laundered white turbans on their heads, and because her knees would suddenly take her no further.

No doubt she would have been over excited in any event, she supposed. Quite apart from the fact of the wedding, this was the first time she had ever actually dressed in the Great House; Helen had insisted she remain in the compound until today, perhaps out of superstition, perhaps because she was afraid to let her charge out of her sight.

For that matter, Meg wasn't at all sure she wanted to be out of Helen's sight. But it was about to happen. She had only seen Billy once in the past month, since, indeed, Helen had decided there was no question about the situation, and had brought John Phillips out to examine her. Then she had gone to visit Walter Reynolds to arrange for the wedding to be brought forward. She had never told Meg what had taken place at that meeting, but Walter Reynolds had promptly arranged a reception to announce the change in plans, at which he had been courtesy itself, although she and Billy had not been allowed a moment together.

He had smiled at her as he had put the diamond solitaire on her finger. With his eyes as well as his mouth ? It was impossible to say. And when she had squeezed his hand there had been no response. Yet Walter Reynolds had been more cheerful than ever. 'Well, he would be,' Helen had said. 'Miss the chance of marrying a Hilton ? He'd need his head examined. Although
..
. he'd be a lot happier if he knew who
...
well, whose child it is likely to be.' She had gazed
at
Meg, and Meg had shaken her head. And Helen had sighed. 'Of course, a great deal of scandal, a great deal of possible, well
...
unpleasantness, even, would be saved were you to
...
well
...
lose the child.'

'Never,' Meg had said, and that had been that.

Because Billy loved her. She must always remember that. But what a silly thing, that a single unmemorable ten minutes with Alan McAvoy should have caused so much trouble. She glanced at Helen, acting as matron of honour, just as her husband was giving the bride away; behind them were her bridesmaids, the Simmonds girls. All were waiting patiently for her to resume moving. Thank God it had not occurred to Helen really to sit down and work out that it must have happened during the voyage from England.

She inhaled, stepped forward, and checked again. 'Prudence.'

All she had been able to learn about her nurse was that Percy had died and she had left Hilltop and gone to work as a domestic in Kingston. But here she was, enormous as ever, wearing a blue gown and a blue turban, and smiling at her. 'Miss Meg, but you loo
king just wonderful, child’

'Why, thank you, Prudence.' Meg looked down at herself. She supposed she did look wonderful; she had not really noticed before, there had been so much on her mind. But the gown was white satin, as her veil was white as her shoes were white as her stockings were white as her underclothes were white. After all, Helen had said, 'No one knows except the immediate family. Why should we make a public confession of it?'

'Prudence,' she said again, and held out her hand. 'You'll come back to work for me.'

'Well, Miss Meg, I got for come back if you does want it.'

'I do. I do. Don't go. I'll talk with you after.'

'They really are waiting,' Helen said.

'And I'm coming.' Somehow the sight of Prudence had given her just the courage she needed. She walked up the aisle left in the centre of the carefully arranged chairs, looking neither to left nor right, gazing at the Reverend Keslop with a fixed half-smile on her lips, while the pianist, playing better than she had ever done, burst into the strains of Mendelssohn's Wedding March.

Billy was still looking at her, and he also had a half-smile on his lips. Of course he would forgive her, had forgiven her. He loved her. It was really no different than if she had come to him a widow. He would have been glad enough to get her then. He was glad enough to get her now.

His fingers closed on hers, and she squeezed, and received a squeeze back. He loved her. Nothing else mattered.

'How beautiful you look, Mrs Hilton,' said Mrs Mottram.

'Charming,' said Mrs Holroyd. 'Absolutely charming.'

'But then it is traditional, isn't it?' said Mrs Mottram. 'For Hilton women to be beautiful. One has only to look at the paintings in the hall.'

Meg sipped champagne. It was her fourth glass, and her nerves were at last beginning to settle. 'Don't you think the artists were intent on flattery, rather than truth?'

'No one could flatter you, my dear,' said Mrs Mottram.

'Charming,' said Mrs Holroyd. 'All Hilton women were charming.'

Meg attempted to look around the crowded room, seeking a rescuer. But it was difficult to catch an eye.

'It is strange, isn't it? said Mrs Mottram. 'You were Miss Margaret Hilton, and now you are Mrs William Hilton.'

'It was Father's wish,' Meg said severely. If she was going to be involved in a lie she was determined to insist upon it.

'Charming,' said Mrs Holroyd. 'I find it absolutely charming.'

'And it must be a great joy to you, once again to be living in the Great House,' said Mrs Mottram.

'Charming,' said Mrs Holroyd. 'It is a most charming place.'

'My grandmother always told me what a wonderful house it was,' Mrs Mottram said. 'She always thought it was a terrible shame that it should be so neglected. But my dear, didn't it cost an
awful
amount to renovate ?'