Read Online Love Became Theirs by Barbara Cartland - Free Book Online

"If we think of it they ought to praise us, and name the ship after us. What do we get?"
    "You get his admiration. He thinks you're wonderful even though he forgets it's your brain which has inspired him."
    Alice mused for a while.
    "That's really rather clever," she said. "If a man wants a good teacher he has to find a woman, like you, to inspire him."
    "Not necessarily like me," Rona said.
    "No, I think Alice is right," said a voice behind them.
    Turning, they saw Peter, regarding them with an amused smile.
    "You've been eavesdropping," Alice accused him.
    "Yes, and I've heard some very interesting things." He strolled forward and leaned on the rail, standing next to Rona. "So that's how the trick is worked, eh?"
    "Oh Miss Johnson," said Alice in dismay, "It's no good. Now he knows the secret it won't work."
    Peter cocked an eyebrow at Rona, as though intrigued to know how she would react. Smiling, she said,
    "Don't worry, Alice. They've known the secret since the dawn of time, but it still works."
    "But how can it?"
    "Because men believe what it suits them to believe," said Rona. "You can always rely on that."
    Peter roared with laughter.
    "It's true, I can't deny it," he said at once.
    "Oh look," said Alice, "there's poor Papa. He looks as if he might be feeling seasick."
    She darted away, but when Rona would have followed her Peter put out a hand to detain her.
    "She doesn't need you if she's with her father," he said. "Stay and tell me about these curious lessons you're teaching my niece."
    "You were not meant to hear."
    "In case we learn the secret? But, as you rightly pointed out, we've always known." He grinned in a way she found delightful. "It's interesting to discover that women teach each other how to make fools of us men. I thought it was something you were all born knowing."
    His droll manner made her smile.
    "We are," she said, "but it helps to refine it. And it isn't all men. Only those stupid and lazy enough to want to believe the lie."
    "You relieve my mind ma'am. So any man who wants to, may console himself with the thought that he's one of the intelligent few that women don't secretly despise. Except that that very belief may only prove that she's making him the biggest fool of all?"
    "Ah!" she said with a pretended sigh. "And there was I, hoping to delude you."
    They laughed together. When the laughter faded they stood for a moment, leaning on the rail, side by side, staring out over the waves.
    Rona knew she should end this conversation. She had resolved to avoid him. But she had never before met a man who engaged her in such delicious verbal duelling, and the pleasure was intoxicating. She would avoid him later, she told herself.
    "I think you're a very clever woman, ma'am," he said. "And the way you've won my niece's confidence is the cleverest thing of all."
    "People told me she was difficult. I don't think so. I think she's just unhappy and lonely and needs a friend."
    "I think so too," he said seriously. "And I'm glad she's found one in you. I should like to call you my friend, also."
    He held out his hand, and she shook it.
    Then a change seemed to come over him. Instead of releasing her hand, he looked down at it, lying in his own, so small and dainty. For a moment he was quite still, as though struck by a thought.
    A tremor went through him. Rona felt it distinctly through the pressure of his hand.
    "Perhaps we should rejoin the others," he said.
    "Yes." She scarcely knew what she said. She felt as though a light had gone out.
    The four of them spent the rest of the time down below, eating a light lunch, and soon they were in Calais.
    There was much to do, supervising the luggage with the help of Alice's maid, and Rona found she had no time to think.
    But then they were on the train from Calais to Paris, with miles and miles to think.
    Now she was pursued by thoughts she would rather avoid. Questions to which she did not know the answer.
    Was he Harlequin? Had he too had a frisson of memory?
    But