He was awed by the mistress of Ernoyeni, by her mature beauty and cool efficiency. She was remote but courteous for the first two weeks or so, referring to him as Mr Anders, and any request was preceded by a meticulous please and followed by an equally punctilious thank you.
When the General and Mark were at Emoyeni for the midday meal, Mark was served by one of the servants from a silver tray in the library, and in the evenings, after he had taken his leave from the General, he climbed on the elderly Abel Square Four motorcycle he had acquired, and clattered off down the hill into the sweltering basin of the city to his verminous lodgings in Point Road.
Ruth Courtney was watching Mark with an even shrewder eye than her husband had used. Had he in any way fallen short of her standards, she would have had no compunction in immediately bringing all her influence to bear on Sean for his dismissal.
One morning while Mark was at work in the library, Ruth came in from the garden with an armful of cut flowers. Don't let me disturb you. She began to arrange the flowers in the silver bowl on the central table. For the first few minutes she worked in silence, and then in a natural and friendly manner, she began to chat to Mark, quietly drawing from him the details of his domestic arrangements where he slept and ate, and who did his laundry, and secretly she was appalled. You must bring your laundry up here, to be done with the household washing. That's very kind of you, Mrs Courtney. I don't want to be a nuisance. Oh nonsense, there are two dhobi wallahs with nothing else to do but wash and iron. Even Ruth Courtney, one of the first ladies of Natal, still a renowned beauty as a matron well past forty years of age, was not immune to Mark's unstudied appeal. To his natural charm was added the beneficial effect his coming had upon her own man.
Sean seemed younger, more lighthearted in these last weeks and watching it, she realized that it was not only the burden of routine work that had been lifted from him.
The boy was giving him back a little of that spirit of youth, that freshness of thought, that energy and enthusiasm for the things of life that had gone slightly stale and seemed no longer quite worth the effort.
It was their custom to spend the hour before bed in Ruth's boudoir, Sean lounging in a quilted dressing-gown, watching her brush out her hair and cream her face, smoking his last cigar, discussing the day's events while he enjoyed her still slim lithe body under the thin silk of her nightdress, feeling the slow awakening of his own body in anticipation of the moment when she would turn from watching him in the mirror and rise, holding out one hand to him, and lead him through into the bedroom, to the huge four-poster bed under the draped and tasselled velvet canopy.
Three or four times in the weeks since Mark's arrival in the household, Sean had made a remark so radical, so unlike his usual old-fashioned conservative self, that Ruth had dropped the silver hairbrush into her lap and turned to stare at him.
Each time he had laughed self-consciously and held up a hand to prevent her teasing. All right, I know what you're going to say, but I was discussing it with young Mark. He would chuckle again. That boy talks a lot of good sense. Then one evening after Mark had been with them just over a month, they had sat in companionable silence for a while when Sean said suddenly, Young Mark, doesn't he remind you of Michael? I hadn't noticed, no, I don't think so. Oh, I don't mean in looks. It's just something about the way he thinks. Ruth felt the old crushing regret welling up within her like a cold dark tide. She had never given Sean a son. It was the only true regret, the only shadow on all their sunlit years together. Her shoulders sagged now, as though under the burden of her regret, and she looked at herself in the mirror, seeing the guilt of her inadequacy in her own eyes.
Sean had not noticed, had gone on blithely, Well, I can hardly wait until February. It's going to break Hamilton's heart to hand over that big silver mug. Mark's changed the whole spirit of the team, They know they can win now, with him shooting number one. She had listened quietly, hating herself for not being able to give him what he had wanted so badly, and she glanced down at the little carved statue of the God Thor on her dressing-table. It had stood there all these years since Sean had given it to her, a talisman of fertility. Storm had been conceived in the height of a raging electrical thunderstorm, and had been named for it. He had joked that it needed thunder and had given her the little godlet. A fat lot of help you were, she thought bitterly, and looked up at her own body under the silk in the mirror. So good to look at, and so damned useless! She did not usually curse, it was a measure of her distress. Lovely as it was, her body would not bear another child. All it was good for now was to give him pleasure. She stood up abruptly, her nightly ritual incomplete, and she crossed to where he sat and removed the cigar from his lips, crushing it out deliberately in the big glass ashtray.
Surprised, he looked up at her, about to ask a question, but the words never reached his lips. Her eyelids were half hooded, they drooped languorously, and her lips pouted slightly to reveal the white small teeth, and there were spots of hectic colour on her high beautifully moulded cheek-bones.
Sean knew this expression and the mood it heralded. He felt his heart lurch and then begin to pound like an animal in the cage of his ribs. Usually their loving was a thing of depth and mutual compassion, a thing grown strong and good over the years, a complete blending of two persons, symbolic of their lives together, but once in a rare while, Ruth would droop her eyelids and pout that way with the colour in her cheeks, and what followed was so wild and wanton and uncontrolled that it reminded him of some devastating natural phenomenon.
She pushed one slim pale hand into his gown, and long nails raked lightly across his stomach so that his skin was instantly tingling and alive, and she leaned forward and with the other hand twined her fingers into his beard and twisted his face up to her and kissed him-in full on the lips, thrusting a sharp pink tongue deep into his mouth, Sean let out a growl, and seized her, trying to draw her down into his lap and at the same time pulling open the bodice of her nightdress so that her small pointed breasts fell free, but she was quick and strong, twisting out of his grip, the ivory and pink sheen of her skin glowing through the transparent silk of her gown and her bared breasts joggling delightfully as she flew on long shapely legs into the bedroom, her laughter mocking and goading and inviting.
The following morning, Ruth cut an armful of crimson and white carnations and carried them into the library where young Mark Anders was at work. He stood up immediately and as she replied to his greetin& she studied his face. She had not truly realized how handsome he was, and she saw now that it was a face that would age well.
There was a good bone structure and a proud strong nose.
He was one of those lucky ones who would improve with the addition of a few wrinkles and lines around the eyes, and a little silver in the hair. That was a long way off, however, now it was the eyes that demanded attention.
Yes, she thought, looking into his eyes. Sean is right.
He has the same strength and goodness that Michael had. She watched him surreptitiously as she worked at her flower arrangement, deliberately picking the words as she began to chat to him, and when she had completed the flower bowl, she stood back to admire her work and spoke without looking at him. Why don't you join us for lunch on the terrace, Mark? and the use of his name was deliberate, both of them very conscious of it as it was spoken. Unless you'd prefer to continue eating here. Sean glanced up from his newspaper as Mark came out on to
