Read Online And No Regrets by Rosalind Brett - Free Book Online Page B

Onitslo ... and her fingers tensed on the chiffon handkerchief as she noticed across the material a smear of poppy-red lipstick, and in one corner the silver-thread initials P.H.
    P atsy Harriman! Ross had run the girl home after that final party at the Macleans, and it looked as though the girl’s poppy-red mouth had left their traces on his face, or his mouth, which he had wiped away with her handkerchief. Then, in the emotion of the moment, he had pushed the chiffon square into his pocket and forgotten all about it .
    C lare shouldn’t have felt such a sharp thrust of resentment, hadn’t she seen for herself back in England that Ross drew the eyes and the attention of women like a magnet? And she knew from Mrs. Maclean that Ross had known Patsy before going on leave to England.
    S he replaced the chiffon handkerchief in his pocket, and hung up the jacket. She slammed the closet door on its starched whiteness, then turned and marched out of his room.
    M ark, the houseboy, was awaiting her. A boat had just pulled in at the river, he told her. It was the boat of a Mr. Carter, who was now on his way to the house ... Clare tensed sharply at the news. The first casual visitor in the six months they had been here, and he had to make his appearance while Ross was away from home !

 
    CHAPTER FIVE
    WHEN Don Carter eventually reached the house, Clare had coffee and a meal awaiting him. He was a wiry young man of middle height, with untidy platinum - fair hair, the clear blue eyes of English blood and a bit of a cleft in his chin.
    “So you’re Mrs. Brennan?” He stood just inside the doorway of the living-room, still holding his topi, the top button of his drill jacket unbuttoned, and a smile of delighted amazeme n t on his good-looking face.
    Clare treated the young man to her gayest smile. “What a shame my husband isn’t here right now, so you could enjoy some man-talk,” she said, feeling a little thrust of misgiving at the way those gay blue eyes embraced her cotton frock and what was inside it.
    “I heard in Onitslo that Ross had brought out his wife,” Don Carter strolled into the room without a touch of shyness. “Has he spoken about me at all?”
    “Your name is familiar ... let me take your hat, Mr . Carter, and do please sit down.”
    He accepted the invitation with alacrity, and the cup of coffee she poured out for him. “Ross and I used to meet once or twice a year when he was out here before—I’m thirty miles up the river,” the blue eyes roved her face. “On my way back there now, from leave.”
    “I’m so sorry Ross is not here—”
    “Oh, don’t be,” he hastened to say. “I’m not a bit sorry, Mrs. Brennan.”
    Her smile faded somewhat at that daring remark. “Ross found it necessary to go down river to look at some rubber trees... ah, here comes my houseboy with some food for you. You must be feeling very hungry, Mr. Carter.”
    “I must admit that I am feeling peckish,” he agreed, skimming appreciative eyes over the pawpaw salad with sliced ham which Mark placed In front of him. “You’ve made a real heaven of this bungalow of Ross’s, i f you don’t mind my saying so. Gosh, when I think of my own shack! He’s a lucky son of a gun!”
    Clare had to smile, marvelling at the way the tropics either aged an Englishman, or kept him curiously boyish . But then Don Carter had only just returned from his leave and was obviously still feeling very fresh and flushed, no doubt, with his success with the ladies. He was certainly a charmer with the platinum hair and that devil-cleft chin.
    He tucked into his meal with gusto, and told her that he had rounded off his leave with a gay fortnight at Onitslo. “One has to dose up with parties i n preparation for the monotony of plantation life,” he said, spooning pear coated with pink jelly and whipped cream. “How do you find life in the bush, Mrs. Brennan? It must be pretty boring for you with Ross away right now?”
    “I have the house to