scarf, and she had used this to tie back her hair.
The severity of the hairstyle and the fragility of the dress combined
to increase her air of vulnerability, and it was this that disturbed her
as she surveyed herself. She did not want to look fragile and
vulnerable. She wanted to look composed-totally in command of
the situation.
The dress was wrong for this too, of course, but the alternative had
been to wear, yet another of Janina's, and none of them appealed to
her. They were all glamorous, and clearly expensive, but their
glamour was an obvious one- designed to take the eye, and
capture a man's attention. The perfect clothes for the transient,
brittle world that Janina occupied, Juliet thought rather sadly.
And what was the point of attracting a man if you knew at the same
time that once his desire was satisfied there would be nothing left
but contempt?
Besides, she was by no means sure that she could continue acting
the part of Janina even for a few hours longer.
The whole charade had become steadily more distasteful to her, and
not even the thought that she was getting the better of Santino on
her sister's behalf could alleviate that unhappy awareness.
She was coming to the conclusion from Santino's remarks-from
his whole attitude-that there was a great deal about Jan, and about
her life since she had started work in Italy, that she did not know
about, and would have preferred to remain in happy ignorance of.
Now that her eyes had been opened to a certain extent, she could
only be thankful that Mim was still living in blissful innocence
about Jan's lifestyle and general morality, All she could hope was
that Santino was prejudiced enough against Jan to have exaggerated
everything he thought and said about her.
Often, Juliet owned to herself rather dazedly, it was as if he was
talking about a complete stranger, not the girl she'd been brought up
with and thought that she knew.
She shook her head and saw the ends of the long scarf float out
behind her as she did so. A little sigh broke from her lips. It was
such a lovely dress-charming and romantic. A dress in which to
dream dreams-a dress for love.
Only there was no love awaiting her downstairs in that lofty room
which seemed to have been hewn out of the solid rock that the
castello stood on. Instead there was a transient passion-a casual
gratification of the senses, if she chose to accept it; a few hours, she
knew, of a delight that she might never know again. But when it
was over, what would remain? The commitment which could have
transmuted that passion into a deeper, more lasting emotion was
totally lacking. After Santino had possessed her, he would despise
her, and when he discovered that she was not even the girl that he
had intended to tame, to bring to heel, then he would despise her
even more.
Juliet turned away from the mirror, her heart sick within her, but
she felt she could delay no longer. The last thing she wanted was
for Santino to come up to this shadowed room to seek her. It was
altogether too intimate a setting for such an encounter, she thought,
her pulses beating wildly, her eyes widening as they fell upon the
bed, immaculately gleaming with freshly laundered linen, with a
nightgown-one of her own, not Jan's-lying across the coverlet
like a drift of snow.
She went slowly out on to the gallery and down the spiral stairs,
lifting her skirt carefully out of the way of her feet as she
descended.
Santino was standing by the window, gazing out into the gathering
darkness, a glass in his hand. Juliet could have sworn she made no
noise as she came down the stairs, but his head came round and he
stared at her as she reached ground level.
'Would you like a drink?' he asked abruptly, his eyes going over her
frowningly, as if he was having difficulty in registering who she
was.
'A fruit juice, please,' she said, adding hastily as his frown
deepened. 'I-I'm rather thirsty. It's been so hot today ...'
He fetched her the juice in a tall glass without a comment, and she
sipped it, clasping her damp hands gratefully round the coolness of
the ice-filled tumbler. She was conscious of a feeling of
disappointment, and realised that childishly she had been hoping
that he would tell her that she looked beautiful, or even that he
would look more closely and know that she wasn't Jan, and that
somehow all explanations would be unnecessary. Fool, she thought
unsteadily.
The room was lit by lamps, and in the dining alcove Annunziata had
set the candles burning in a magnificent candelabrum.
'It looks so right,' she murmured, half to herself, and flushed slightly
as she encountered Santino's questioning gaze. 'The candles, I
mean, in that particular setting.'
'Are you a romantic, Janina?' His smile was slightly twisted. 'I
wouldn't have thought it. Next you will tell me that you have started
to fall in love with your prison.'
She wanted to say, 'Not with my prison, but with my jailer.' Instead
she heard herself saying in a prim little voice, totally unlike her
own, 'I've always been interested in history. I suppose the castello
is very old.'
'Si.' The tawny eyes were mockingly alight, as if he knew why she
was deliberately avoiding any subject of conversation which could
be interpreted as personal. 'It was built originally by the Saracens, I
believe. Since then it has been destroyed and rebuilt several times,
of course.'
'And have you lived here long?' She took another refreshing sip of
her fruit juice, avoiding his direct glance.
'Long enough,' he said rather drily. 'It changed hands several times
before I came on the scene. It needed a lot of work, and I think the
prospect of the time and money it would take deterred many people
from tackling the task.'
'But not you, of course,' she said, her own tone a little dry.
He smiled. 'It is true,' he said softly. 'From my earliest childhood, I
dreamed that one day I would live in such a place. There was a plan
to turn it into a hotel, which I was fortunately able to prevent.'
'Are you against tourism?'
'No, I think it could be of immense benefit in an area as poor as this
has been, yet this castello is not big enough to make a successful
hotel. I felt it would be better used as a private residence. But that
has not stopped me joining a consortium of other business men who
are building a chain of luxury hotels along this stretch of coastline.'
'It won't-spoil your dream to have to share it with
others?' she asked rather shyly, and he frowned again.
'Dreams are for children,' he said coldly. 'Only fools confuse them
with life's realities.' He swallowed the contents of his glass in one
gulp and moved back to replace it on the tray.
Juliet felt a kind of simmering anger emanating from him, but she
had no idea what she could have said or done to have inspired it,
but she remembered he had reacted in very much the same way on
other occasions when she had attempted to get close to him, to find
out what he thought and believed. It was further proof, if proof she
needed, that his sole interest in her was physical. Her feelings, her
emotions, her thoughts had probably never even entered his mind.
Santino didn't want any kind of intellectual stimulation from a
woman, she thought sadly, he merely required a willing body to
share his bed, and she was simply fooling herself if she imagined
that her resistance to his attempts to make love to her would arouse
either his interest or ultimately his respect. If he found he could not
seduce her, then he would probably shrug his shoulders and write
her off as a miscalculation. The fact that he had encountered a girl
who wasn't willing to fall immediately into bed with him wouldn't
impress him in the slightest. He would find it simply a trifling
irritation, nothing more. In the days ahead, he wouldn't even regard
the incident with a tinge of regret. He would regard that as
sentimentality, fit only for children along with dreams.
He did not return to the sofa where she sat, her slim body stiff with
tension, but remained standing by the ' window as he had been
when she came downstairs. She found herself wondering precisely
what his brooding gaze could be fixed on, because surely it was too
dark to see anything now.
She was almost glad when a clatter at the door and quick bustling
movements announced the arrival of Annunziata with the soup.
Once it was served, Annunziata did not leave right away, but stood
watching them taste it, smiling warmly and proudly. She had every
right to feel proud, Juliet thought, as she spooned up some of the
thick hot liquid, redolent with meat and vegetables and herbs. It
was good enough to be a meal in itself, and in a strange way she felt
it was putting new life, new heart into her.
But at last Santino glanced up and said something to her. Juliet
could not catch the words, which were uttered in a low voice, but
she heard the tone, and although not unkind it was firmly
dismissive, and Annunziata lost no time in making herself scarce.
Juliet bent her head over her plate, instinctively avoiding the glance
of the man who sat confronting her across the flickering candles.
Here in the dining alcove, they seemed curiously cut off from the
rest of the castello, the thick walls closing intimately around them,
the candles casting a pool if light which seemed to be the oily