City of Jasmine. Deanna Raybourn

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ agreed to let me divorce him. We had left Shanghai on separate ships.

      “It was like I never even knew him at all,” I told Wally as I stared at the photograph. “He just escorted me to the ship as politely as if I were an acquaintance and lifted his hat in farewell.” I broke off, swallowing hard. “It’s absurd, but I always hated to think it was the last memory I would ever have of him.”

      “You were divorcing him,” Wally pointed out.

      “Yes, but it was so unlike him, at least it was unlike the man I thought I married. That moment when I stood on that deck watching him leave was the very worst of it. It was like saying goodbye to a stranger.”

      “I don’t suppose most divorces are terribly amicable,” he said reasonably. “After all, no one likes to get chucked away like last night’s dinner.”

      “I suppose.”

      “And weren’t you the one who asked for a divorce?”

      “Yes, but—oh, never mind! I’ve wasted too many years thinking about him already. Let’s just forget this and get on with the trip. Hand me the map book, will you? I want to plot the course across the Caspian.”

      I rose hastily and threw the photograph into the fire in a savage gesture then snatched it back almost as quickly. The burned edge of it singed my finger and I sucked at the tender skin, cursing under my breath. I couldn’t bring myself to completely destroy the photograph, and I didn’t want to think too hard about what that might mean. I walked to the wastepaper basket and dropped the photograph inside. “Damn him.”

      Wally rose calmly and retrieved it. He put it into my hand, folding my fingers gently around it.

      “What did you do that for?” I demanded.

      “Because it’s time you stopped running, Evie. For you, Gabriel Starke is past and present, and somewhere, I don’t know how, perhaps your future, as well. You’ll never be free of him if you don’t go and find out.”

      “Go?”

      He sighed. “Woman, you try my patience. To Damascus. You must go to Damascus and find him if he’s there.”

      I blinked up at him. “But why? For what possible purpose?”

      “That’s up to you, my dear. Strike him, swear at him, kiss him or kill him, I don’t much care. But you will never bury your dead so long as there is a chance he is still alive in this world.”

      I looked at the photograph. The edge was charred, but the image was clear. Gabriel’s expression was as inscrutable as I remembered. “No,” I said finally. “Oh, it’s tempting, I’ll grant you that. But we still have the tour to finish.”

      I waited for Wally to contradict me, but he didn’t. A change of subject was in order.

      I nodded towards his own letters. “What did your father have to say?” I asked.

      He slumped further into his chair, crossing his long legs at the ankle and staring up at the ceiling. “Much as I expected. I must marry. I must have sons.”

      “Same song, second verse,” I said lightly.

      He lowered his head and smiled. “Oh, a new tune, though. He’s threatening to cut off my allowance.”

      He passed me the letter and I skimmed it quickly. Certain damning phrases jumped out at me...wasting your life...feckless...dishonour to the name...not much time...doctor not optimistic. I gave it back to him.

      “I’m so sorry, Wally. What will you do?”

      He shrugged. “What can I do? I must go home to Mistledown. I can hold him off for the last leg of the trip, but no more adventures after that, I’m afraid. Egypt will be the end of the road for me, love.”

      I slipped to the floor and put my head on his knee. He ran an absent hand through my short curls. “I ought to take him at his word and marry you,” he said after a while.

      “That’s the whisky talking.” I turned my head to look at him. “Have you ever considered telling him the truth?”

      His smile was sad and distant as a martyred saint’s. “Telling the Right Honourable Viscount Walters that his only son and heir is a poof? Have a heart, dear girl. He’s already got one foot tickling the grave. That would finish him off.”

      “I imagine you’re right.”

      He sipped thoughtfully at his drink. “I suppose we could get married, though. I would get respectability and you’d have a lovely title to lord over all those nasty people who have nothing better to do than gossip about you.”

      I slipped my hand into his. “Putting one over on the society cats is hardly reason enough to get married.”

      “With you I could provide the estate with an heir,” he mused.

      “But would you want to?”

      He reached down and kissed my cheek. “No. Not even with you, and I adore you. I’ll simply have to go back to Mistledown and make the best of things. I shall be a proper lord of the manor, and when the time comes, it will all pass to a feeble-minded cousin in Ireland.”

      “Is he really feeble-minded?”

      “Well, he’s Irish, so it’s difficult to tell,” he said with a twinkle. I slapped at his leg.

      “Don’t be catty.” I picked up the photograph. “I can tell you think I’m an awful fool for not going to Damascus.”

      “Yes, I do.”

      “But why?”

      Wally leaned down and put his cheek against mine. “Because somewhere in your very large, very tender heart, you are hoping it was all a terrible mistake and that he is alive.”

      I reared back as if he’d struck me. “Hoping! What an extraordinary thing to say.”

      “But a truthful one. Evie, everyone else sees the brave face. Everyone else sees the big smile and the plucky girl who flies her little plane and waves for the cameras and flogs boots and face cream. But I see everything else. I see the shadows under your eyes when you’ve sat up half the night thinking about him. I see the hunted expression you get anytime his name is mentioned. And I see that somewhere beneath the sophisticated, glamorous façade of the barnstormer who crosses the globe with nothing but her dancing slippers and her best lipstick is the heartbroken girl whose husband called her bluff and left her sitting on a ship when she thought he would come crawling back.”

      I blinked back unshed tears, my throat tight and hot. “Damn you.”

      “People are always damning me,” he said with a sigh. “And it’s always because I’m right.”

      I looked at the photograph again. “Do you really think he’s there?”

      He shrugged. “I haven’t the faintest idea. The point is it doesn’t really matter, dear girl. What counts is that you find some answers once and for all. You’ve spent the last five years running away from everything, dashing off on another СКАЧАТЬ