Come the Vintage Page 4

  The priest insisted that they join in the toast, and he patted Alain on the shoulder and told Ryan that her father would have been so happy had he been alive to see this day. Alain had been like a son to him, he said, and it was always her father’s dearest wish that his two loved ones should meet.

  Ryan couldn’t help thinking that had her father still been alive, this day would not have occurred. She wondered how much the priest had known of her father’s affairs, of the terms of his will, and decided he had probably been a witness to it. He obviously shared her father’s and Alain’s belief that marriage should first and foremost be treated as a business arrangement, but the cold-bloodedness of it, the calculating method of its inception, filled Ryan with despair.

  Custom satisfied, they turned to the meal. Alain served the priest first, then Ryan, and finally himself. If he was surprised that Ryan would accept nothing more than a small steak and half a tomato, he made no comment, and for this she was thankful. But when she cut into the meat she found to her horror that although the outer casing was brown and smelt appetizing, inside the core was still hard and frozen.

  She looked up aghast to find Alain and the priest eating silently, apparently unperturbed at the rawness of the meat, but her stomach revolted. What must they be thinking of her? she thought desperately. Were neither of them going to say anything? They must know she had not thawed it before cooking. They would think her an absolute idiot!

  She pushed her plate aside, and waited for one of them to speak. But they said nothing, and she suddenly felt furiously angry. She didn’t want their pity, she didn’t want them to pretend to enjoy something so as not to hurt her feelings. It was too galling to contemplate!

  Taking a deep breath, she burst out: ‘Don’t eat it! It’s horrible! It’s raw! The cat ate the meat I thawed, and I didn’t have time to thaw any more.’

  Abbé Maurice lifted his head in an embarrassed way, and Alain regarded her steadily. ‘Don’t be silly, Ryan. I prefer my steak rare.’

  ‘There’s a difference between rare and raw!’ declared Ryan vehemently.

  ‘I tell you, it’s all right.’ Alain’s eyes had hardened slightly.

  Ryan’s lips moved tremulously. ‘Well, I’m not going to eat it,’ she retorted, pushing back her chair and getting to her feet.

  ‘Where do you think you are going?’ demanded Alain, half rising also, but she didn’t reply, she merely shook her head and walked unsteadily to the door.

  Somehow she made it to her room, closing the door and sinking down on the bed, tears probing hotly at her eyes. Her first meal and it was a disaster! She would never learned to cope as efficiently as Berthe.

  The door opened on her misery and she looked up in amazement to see Alain de Beaunes blocking the doorway with his bulk. His eyes were dark and angry, and his mouth was a thin line in his tanned features. He came into the room and stood looking down at her coldly.

  ‘What do you think you are doing?’ he inquired tautly. ‘Is it your practice to abandon your guest half-way through the meal?’

  ‘He’s not my guest, he’s yours,’ she managed, biting her lips to stop them from trembling.

  ‘He is our guest,’ Alain corrected her shortly. ‘Stop behaving so childishly. So—the meat is not thoroughly cooked! No one expects you to produce a perfect meal at the first attempt.’

  ‘Oh, thank you. That’s very reassuring to know!’ she exclaimed with heavy sarcasm.

  He thrust his hands into the hip pockets of his trousers, tautening the cloth across his thighs. ‘I make allowances for your immaturity, little cat. Be thankful that I do.’

  Ryan turned her head away, her eyes smarting from tears suppressed. ‘I don’t remember inviting you into my room, monsieur. Aren’t you supposed to knock before entering a lady’s bedroom?’

  The exclamation he made was half anger, half amusement. ‘You are determined to challenge me, are you not, little one?’ he commented quietly. Then he turned towards the door. ‘Very well. You have five minutes to tidy yourself, and then you will join the good Abbé and me for dessert. Do I make myself clear?’

  Ryan turned to face him protestingly. ‘I don’t want anything else.’

  ‘Maybe not.’ His eyes assessed her in a way that caused the blood to quicken in her veins. ‘You had no breakfast, did you? In spite of what I said. Your colour is high at the moment, but underneath you are pale. It is food you require, little one. Perhaps not the steak, I admit, but maybe some soup would not come amiss, eh?’

  Ryan’s stomach heaved restlessly. ‘There is no soup.’

  ‘There are tins. Even I am proficient with a tin opener.’ He paused in the doorway and looked back at her. ‘You are all right now?’

  Ryan hesitated, and then she nodded. And she was. It was true. Although he had not sympathized with her, his quiet words had restored a little of her confidence. The knowledge surprised her.

  CHAPTER THREE

  RYAN and Alain de Beaunes were married three weeks later in the small church of St. Augustine in the village of Bellaise. The service was conducted by the Abbé himself, and as neither Ryan nor Alain had any close family present it was a very quiet affair.

  During those weeks preceding the wedding, Ryan felt herself to be living in a vacuum. The whole structure of her life had changed drastically and become slightly unreal, so that she found it hard to absorb what was going on around her. Most particularly her relationship with her future husband.

  It was the time of year after the excitement of the grape harvest when a certain amount of anti-climax crept into the production of the year’s vintage. The initial pressing of the grapes had been achieved, and the juice transferred to casks for fermentation. Only time would tell whether the matured wine would measure up to their expectations, and consequently Alain was often at home, working in his study, and Ryan could never completely relax when he was in the house.

  He had taken her, as her father had done, down to the winery, and she had descended with him into the massive stone cellars where there were casks of wine which had been maturing for a number of years. He had seemed determined that she should learn the basic fundamentals of the business, and had spent some time explaining the various difficulties they could encounter. She had met the elderly Breton again who had worked for her father, and his father before him, and shivered in the vaultlike caverns between the rows of vats.

  The Ferrier vineyards bottled their own wine, and Alain showed her the small plant. He explained how later in the process the wine would be put into bottles and corked, and then inverted in racks to collect impurities on the cork. Afterwards, he said, these corks would be removed and the bottles recorked. In making a good red wine a certain amount of the crushed flesh of the grape was left in the juice during the initial stages of fermentation, but the finished product was required to have a clarity free of all sediment.

  During these almost educational tours of inspection, Ryan could almost forget the improbability of their relationship. It was only when one or other of their employees congratulated Alain on his good fortune that the truth possessed her in all its terrifying reality. During the long nights when sleep was often elusive, she lay imagining the frightening possibilities of what she was about to do. What did she really know of this man who was to be her husband? The fact that her father had cared for him and depended upon him meant little to her. The relationship between two men was vastly different from the relationship between a man and his wife. The power over her which this marriage would give Alain de Beaunes was not to be considered lightly, and she had no sure way of knowing that he would keep his word about anything.

  Her only companions during those weeks before the wedding were the old priest, and Marie, the girl from the village whom Alain had employed to help her. Marie was a year older than Ryan, and her initial shyness gave way to a genuine affection for the younger girl. In her way, she understood Ryan’s doubts about the marriage, although her reasons for so doing differed from Ryan’s own.

&
nbsp; To Marie, it was all so simple. Alain de Beaunes was very much a man, all the women in the village thought so, whereas Ryan was little more than a child. Naturally she was anxious that he should not be disappointed in her, self-conscious about the physical aspects of the marriage. But that was nothing to worry about. The monsieur was no amateur, she had heard, and she would without doubt find experience something infinitely pleasurable to gain.

  Ryan supposed that compared to Marie she was child-like. Her knowledge of the opposite sex was limited to several furtive embraces on the doorstep of her aunt’s house after youth club socials and the like. She had never had a steady boy-friend, preferring her own company to that of some youth who seemed to think he owed it to himself to attempt to paw her about, and whose conversation was confined to television and the latest group on the pop music scene. Her upbringing had been rather old-fashioned, but through choice rather than direction.

  And Marie could not have been further from the truth with regard to her coming marriage. The physical side of that relationship was something she did not hope to gain any experience of.

  Marie on the other hand had had two lovers already, and had lost count of the number of boys she had known. She found Ryan’s innocence rather touching, and tried, in her friendly way, to reassure her. From time to time Ryan had seen Marie’s eyes resting rather enviously on the broad shoulders and lean face of the master of the house, and had realized that a man like Alain de Beaunes would have no difficulty in finding a woman to satisfy his male appetites. The knowledge disturbed her somewhat, though she didn’t know why it should. It was of no interest to her how many women he chose to make love to, and no doubt, after they were married, she would feel grateful to those other women for diverting his attention from her.

  * * *

  After the wedding ceremony Ryan and Alain and the priest drove back to the house.

  Ryan was glad to get home and change out of the white wedding dress which Marie had insisted on lending her. As Ryan had neither the time nor the inclination to buy a wedding dress of her own, she supposed she ought to have been grateful to the girl for providing something suitable for her to wear. But the slightly yellowed lace gown, which had already been worn by several members of Marie’s family, had been made for much more voluptuous curves than Ryan possessed, and consequently it hung on her slim shoulders and looked quite dreadful to her eyes.

  Alain wore a suit of navy blue suede which fitted his powerful body closely. Ryan had not seen it before, and its darkness accentuated the intense lightness of his straight hair. White cuffs showed against tanned wrists, liberally covered with hairs, and she felt a rekindling of the aversion she had felt towards him when they had first met. He was so blatantly masculine, so confident, so arrogantly sure of himself and of her. And why not? she asked herself bitterly. She had done exactly as he wanted. She chose not to remember that it was what her father had wanted first of all.

  In her room she stripped off the hated dress and looked round for her jeans. They were not lying on the chair where she had left them, and when she impatiently tugged open the dressing table drawer, she found her other clothes were missing, too.

  Her brows drew together in perplexity. Marie had been in the house when they left for the church. Had she taken the things? Why should she? What possible use could they be to her? No, she would never do such a thing. Ryan was sure the girl was not a thief. So where were they?

  A startling idea sent her scurrying along the landing to Alain’s room. She could hear the sound of his voice and the Abbé’s downstairs, so she felt no anxiety when she thrust open the door and went into his room. With trembling fingers she pulled open a drawer in his dressing table. It revealed only socks and underwear, and she quickly shut it again. A second drawer displayed shirts and sweaters, but at the third attempt she found what she was looking for. A layer of lingerie concealed nightwear and toiletries.

  She stood with her fingertips pressed to her lips, staring down at the contents of the drawer, and an awful sick sensation filled her stomach. Marie must have moved her things while they were at church. But on whose authority?

  ‘So—what have we here?’

  Ryan swung round in alarm at the unexpected sound of Alain’s voice. He was standing in the doorway, leaning negligently against the jamb, but there was a coldness about his eyes which belied the mockery of his tone.

  ‘I—I—’ Ryan suddenly remembered that the best method of defence was attack. ‘How—how dare you have my clothes shifted into your room?’

  Alain’s expression did not alter, but he looked past her to the open dressing table drawer. ‘Marie must have done it,’ he said evenly.

  ‘Yes. Yes, I know. But on—on whose authority?’

  Alain straightened. ‘Not mine, I can assure you.’

  Ryan glanced back at the drawer and as she did so saw her own reflection in the dressing table mirror. She was suddenly made aware that she was facing him in her pants and slip and little else. She crossed her arms across her rounded breasts, and shifted uncomfortably.

  ‘I want—I want my jeans, and—and a shirt,’ she stated unsteadily.

  ‘Get them.’ He walked indolently into the room, unbuttoning his jacket.

  ‘If you’ll give me five minutes—’

  He turned on her then. ‘For God’s sake, Ryan, grow up! We are married, remember? Or have you so soon forgotten?’

  ‘No, I haven’t forgotten,’ she retorted, her lips trembling. ‘I remember quite well that you said that it was to be a marriage of convenience only—’

  ‘So it is!’ He stared at her with eyes filled with dislike. ‘What do you expect me to do? This is my room. I have more right here than you do. Just because some foolish serving girl has taken it into her head to bring your clothes in here, it does not alter the situation between us. No doubt she expected you to be pleased. The fact that you are not is something you should take up with her, not me!’

  Ryan stared at him frustratedly, continuing to shield her body with her arms. ‘How—how can I get changed with you—you here?’

  ‘I believe the usual practice is to unfasten one’s clothes and take them off, and then put something else on,’ he returned sardonically, taking off his jacket. ‘Do you want me to demonstrate?’

  ‘You—you wouldn’t dare!’ she breathed.

  ‘Why not?’ To her horror his fingers moved to the belt of his trousers. ‘Have you never seen an adult male without clothes before?’

  ‘Of course not!’

  She turned abruptly away, and he uttered an impatient exclamation. ‘Very well,’ he said, walking towards the door, and looking back at her, ‘I’ll give you five minutes to find what you want, and then I’m going to get changed, right?’

  Ryan nodded mutely, and the door closed behind him. With his going she flew into an agony of haste and fumbling ineptitude. Her jeans were eventually located in the wardrobe, and she tugged them on, and was fastening the buttons of a dark red shirt when he came back. He viewed her appearance critically for a few moments, and then ignoring her he began to unbutton his shirt.

  ‘I—I’ll move my things back into my own room later on,’ she ventured tentatively from the doorway.

  He shrugged, ‘As you like,’ and she closed the door quietly behind her.

  In her own room, she gave a little more thought to her appearance. She had had no intention of dressing up in anything frivolous and feminine for Alain de Beaunes’ benefit, no matter what the Abbé Maurice might think, but she was totally unaware that in the casual garments she had a youthful charm and attraction that owed nothing to artifice. She had grown so used to the thick curtain of her hair which curved under at her shoulders, the slightly slanted hazel eyes and tip-tilted nose, a mouth that was wide and mobile, that she no longer appreciated the beauty which together they created.

  She touched the colour in her cheeks brought there by Alain’s disturbing comments. Ryan de Beaunes! She said the name experimentally. That was her name now. Wi
fe to Alain de Beaunes, a man she had known for little more than a month. A man moreover, she was realizing, she knew next to nothing about.

  Downstairs, the old Abbé was rocking himself before the blazing fire, a glass of wine resting comfortably in his hand. He looked round as Ryan entered the room, and what he saw seemed to please him because he smiled rather contentedly, and said:

  ‘I won’t linger too long, madame. I am not without discretion, I can assure you.’

  ‘Oh, but—’ Ryan licked her lips. ‘You’ll stay for dinner, won’t you?’

  The priest shook his head. ‘Some wine,’ he said, raising his glass, ‘and a chance to wish you well, and then I shall be gone.’

  Sheer terror stiffened Ryan’s legs so that she could scarcely walk across the room. In half an hour—an hour at most—she would be alone with the man who was now her husband. What a fool she had been to imagine she could go through with it!

  ‘Father—’ she was beginning desperately, when the door opened behind her and Alain came into the kitchen. He had shed the navy suede suit for green corded pants and a cream sweater, and to her eyes he looked bigger and more powerful than ever. She quaked at the idea of attempting to thwart him. She wouldn’t stand a chance, and the law was all on his side now.

  As though her pale strained features mirrored her thoughts, Alain’s eyes narrowed as they rested upon her. ‘Get some glasses, Ryan,’ he said harshly. ‘I have some champagne on ice for this most special occasion.’

  She doubted that the Abbé Maurice was aware of the irony in his tones, but she was aware of it and was glad. Surely, if he could speak so mockingly of the situation, he found no great advantages in it. If only she could believe…

  The Dom Perignon was wasted on her. She had only tasted champagne once before, and it was not something she particularly cared for. She preferred the still, smooth wines to the sparkling ones.