The Beads of Nemesis Read online

  “Aren’t you glad to be home?” she had said to Pericles as he had bent to pick their luggage out of the boot.

  “Is it home to you already?” he had smiled at her.

  She had been a bit surprised herself, but there had been no doubt in her own mind that this was home, whereas her father’s house had been no more than a memory of childhood to her. She had nodded her head, feeling lost and a bit presumptuous for implying that Kyria Holmes’ villa in some way belonged to her too.

  “I expect my mother and the children are already in bed and asleep,” he had said, catching up with her at the front door. “Which is where you ought to be. I’ll put your things in your old room and you can stay there for tonight.”

  She had felt quite unable to argue with him about it, especially as she knew from experience how the slightest sound echoed up and down the hall, and the last thing she had wanted was to have Pericles’ mother out on them. Besides, she had reasoned, feeling more and more leaden by the minute, it would only be for the one night, or what was left of it, and she could make the change into his room the following day. She had known, of course, that she would never find the courage to suggest such a thing herself, but she had been confident that he would insist on it, if for no better reason than for the look of the thing.

  But he had done nothing of the sort. In fact he had done nothing at all. She might just as well not be married to him at all! She had hardly seen him in the last few days and, when she had seen him, she had found herself rendered almost completely tongue-tied, so nervous had she been of saying anything untoward. She was bound to admit that he had been more than patient with this sudden

  affliction that had taken her, but then perhaps he hadn’t noticed that she had lost her tongue and that she started like a nervous rabbit whenever he looked at her! Oh, how she despised herself when she thought of it!

  “I’m glad you went,” Peggy assured her happily. “You wouldn’t have brought back my stamp collection if you hadn’t gone.”

  “It wasn’t much fun while you were away, though,” Kimon told her. “I much prefer it when you are here. Daddy says he does too.” Morag’s heart lurched within her. When had he said that? she wondered.

  “What do you want to do this afternoon?” she asked the children. “We could take the bus somewhere, if you like?”

  “Athens,” said Kimon with decision.

  “It’s too hot in Athens,” Peggy argued. “I’d rather go swimming.” Kimon made a face at her. “You always want to go swimming!” He gave Morag a sudden smile that was very like his father’s. “What do you want to do? You ought to choose sometimes too.”

  “You like swimming!” Peggy reminded her quickly, anxious that she was not going to get her own way after all.

  “Yes, I do. But we went swimming this morning. I’d like to go to Athens too. I want to do some shopping

  Both children groaned at that. “I hate shopping!” Kimon muttered. His face brightened, though, as a new idea struck him. “Yes, you go shopping, and we can go to the museum and see all the different coins there. I want to compare my Spartan coin with the ones they have there. We’d be quite all right on our own in the museum, truly we would! And we could all have an ice-cream outside afterwards.”

  “Yes,” said Peggy. “I like to see the man there carrying a mountain of things on his tray. I don’t know how he remembers who wants what. May we do that, Morag?”

  Glad to have found a compromise so easily, Morag said they would go immediately after lunch. Kyria Holmes, when told of the plan, thought at first she would like to go with them, but in the end she decided against it.

  “Since you talked me into painting again,” she said to her daughter-in-law with a wry smile, “I have done little else. You must tell me if you think any of my canvases are good enough to show to Pericles.”

  “I don’t know if I’d know,” Morag told her. “I’d love to see them, though. Are they all landscapes?”

  “No, not at all.” The older woman’s eyes glinted in the sunlight. “I’ve been meaning to ask you to call me Dora,” she said. “I don’t think I should care for Mama - it’s bad enough that Perry calls me that! - and we can’t go on being formal forever.”

  Morag’s face was filled with surprised pleasure. “Thank you,” she murmured.

  Dora gave her an amused look. “I’m glad you like living here,” she went on coolly. “Pericles is afraid that you may be lonely as he had so much business to get through, but you seem to fill your days pretty well. I find it hard to believe as he does that you want your family to visit you quite yet! But you have only to ask - you know there is plenty of room!” Morag answered quickly, “I don’t think they’d want to come quite yet!” “No? Your stepsister longs to come to Greece, I’m told. Pericles says she’s a raving beauty. Perhaps I should paint her some time.”

  Morag swallowed down the comment that beauty is as beauty does with difficulty. She thought Dora might have some difficulty in understanding the allusion, but she couldn’t possibly mistake the tone.

  “If Pericles wants to ask her,” she began, “I should - should have no objection.”

  Dora shrugged, unmoved by these wifely sentiments. “You’d better tell him that! But I should remember my dear, that Pericles is a man like any other, and the Greeks have always found it very hard to resist physical beauty - especially when there is nothing else to distract them!” Morag shrugged her shoulders. “That’s not my fault!” “No?” Morag, who had grown daily more at ease with Pericles’ mother, had forgotten how imperious she could be. “It would only take a word from you -”

  “No. He arranged things this way. I’m not going to ask him for anything!”

  Dora shrugged again. “Have you ever thought that it’s more generous sometimes to take than to give? Why don’t you have it out with him once and for all? At least he’d know what you wanted from him, and not just what you are willing to give, no matter how willingly!”

  Morag shrank away from her impatience. “I couldn’t,” she said in a small voice.

  “But how is he to know you’re in love with him if you don’t tell him?”

  her mother-in-law demanded unanswerably.

  “You don’t think he’s guessed?” Morag asked faintly. “Oh, don’t ask me! I’m only his mother! You’d better get on to Athens and do your shopping before I start giving you some very bad advice which you won’t take. I doted on my own husband, not that he cared whether I did or not as long as I was there to fulfill his needs. But Pericles is different. I’d say it was his English blood, but what else was his father? Susan’s indifference worried him very much, though she could hardly have married young Takis, no matter how much in love with him she fancied herself to be. Love grows after marriage, if you let it, but Pericles won’t see that. I can’t think why he married you!” Morag’s eyes filled with tears. “Why don’t you ask him?”

  “My dear child, I keep telling you that Pericles is a full-grown man! I have no right to ask him any such thing. A man’s life is his own. It’s quite different for a woman. It’s her nature to respond and not to initiate, so she can be taught to love and to live her life subordinate to her husband’s. That is the Greek way.”

  “Perry is only half Greek!”

  Dora laughed. “Maybe, but he’s man enough for you, Morag Holmes, as you’ll find out one of these days!”

  It wasn’t a very auspicious start to the afternoon and, by the time she had collected the children, they had missed the bus and had to wait for the next one in the burning heat of the afternoon, a prospect that didn’t please any of them. Morag and Peggy sat on a low wall by the side of the road, but Kimon was made of sterner stuff and spent the time spotting the different makes of cars that flashed past him.

  “Look, there’s Takis!” he shouted after a few minutes. “He’ll take us to Athens. Make him stop, Morag! He won’t be able to see me!”

  Morag stood up and waved her scarf half-heartedly. She rather hoped that Takis would go by
without stopping, but with a screech from his brakes he drew in beside them, grinning broadly.

  “How can I serve you, Morag? Do you wish me to carry you away from all your troubles?”

  “What troubles?” Peggy asked him, not at all pleased that he should have spoken only to Morag thus, ignoring Kimon and herself.

  “What troubles? You and Kimon are the biggest troubles. Her other ones she prefers to keep to herself! Well, Morag, where do you want to go?”

  “We want to go to Athens, but we missed the bus and the next one doesn’t come for another twenty minutes.” “Then of course I shall take you! You see how I feel about you that your, lightest desire is my immediate command. You shall sit beside me and we shall forget all about the children in the back and have a nice time. Is that what you’d like?”

  “Not much,” she answered frankly. “I wouldn’t ask you to take us at all if it weren’t so hot!”

  “You are unkind!” Takis complained.

  “Very!” she agreed.

  The young Greek exploded into laughter. “Unkind, but funny! Climb in, children. One is not allowed to stop here and a policeman may come at any moment. Have you enough room, Morag? You can come closer. I do not mind!” Morag sat as far away from him as possible, trying not to notice the handle that was sticking into her ribs, or his straying hand that somehow found her knee every time he changed gear.

  “We’re going to the Museum,” Peggy told him. “I’d rather have gone swimming, but we’re going to meet Morag for an ice-cream outside afterwards.”

  “Oh? And where do you spend your afternoon, Morag?

  “Hullo, Delia,” she said in a strained voice.

  “Oh? And where do you spend your afternoon, Morag?” Takis asked.

  “I’ve got some shopping to do,” she said reluctantly.

  He flashed her a smile. “What do you buy? A new dress? I shall come with you and help you choose! I have a very good eye for buying dresses.”

  “I’d rather you didn’t.”

  “No woman should go shopping by herself,” he declared. “They need someone to tell them that look beautiful in one dress, or more desirable in another. You will see, I am very good at escorting women and I always know exactly the right thing to say! Besides, I can translate all your wishes to the assistants and make sure you get what you want.”

  Morag sighed. She decided complete honesty was the only way to deal with him and she scurried round her mind for the right words in which to tell him that she didn’t want his company. “Takis, please leave me alone. P-Pericles wouldn’t like it, and I don’t like it either!”

  His eyebrows rose in complete disbelief. “P-Pericles,” he mimicked

  her. “Do you mind about him?”

  “Of course I do!”

  “He doesn’t seem to return the compliment! If you were my bride, you would not be waiting for a bus under the hot sun! He deserves that you should look elsewhere for a little fun. Why doesn’t he buy you a car?”

  Morag hesitated. Then, “I don’t drive,” she confessed, “Pericles could teach you!”

  Morag felt more uncomfortable and hot than ever. “I can drive, only I

  don’t, so it’s my own choice to wait around for buses. “Pericles could

  drive you himself!”

  “Why should he? He has better things to do with his time!”

  “But I haven’t? From now on I am your chauffeur. You have only to ask and I shall be there to drive you!”

  “No, Takis. If I wanted anyone to drive me, I’d ask Pericles! It was only

  this afternoon when we missed the bus and Kimon saw you that we

  needed a lift. Usually we can manage very well by ourselves!”

  “No thanks to Pericles!”

  Morag glared at him. “I won’t have you sneering at him!” she retorted. “He’s very kind to me, and I love him very much!”

  Takis lost some of his bounce and began to apologise. “I hadn’t realised that you felt like that about him,” he protested. “I thought it was a suitable arrangement for you both. Though I still feel he could look after you better!” His smile came back, and he patted her knee. “You defend him just like a Greek wife!” he teased her. “Are you as meek as a Greek wife should be to Pericles?”

  Morag looked determinedly out of the window. She saw with relief that they were almost in Athens. “I try to be,” she said.

  Takis chuckled. “It would be interesting to find out if he defends you with the same fervour. He was never in the least bit strict with Susan.” He drove in silence all the rest of the way into the centre of Athens, only asking her where she wanted to be put down. “There’s a place to park just by the temple of Olympian Zeus. Will that be too far for you to walk?”

  Morag had no idea, but she was in no mood to argue with him. “Of course not,” she said with a confidence she was far from feeling.

  “But it is!” Kimon insisted, breaking abruptly into the argument he had been having with his sister ever since they had set foot into the car. “Can’t you take us right to the museum, Takis? Or to Omonia Square?” “If you like,” the Greek agreed easily. He pointed out the Royal Guard

  outside the Parliamentary buildings, dressed in the short white kilts, white stockings, and long shoes with their pouffs on the toes.

  “Along here are the shops,” Peggy told Morag. “Grandma buys her clothes here. They’re very good shops, but there aren’t any department stores like in London - at least, I don’t think there are. You won’t get lost, will you?” “No, of course I won’t get lost!” Morag protested. “I’ll come and see you into the museum first.”

  Takis stopped the car and leaned across her to open the door. “You’re not still cross with me, are you, Morag?” he asked her, smiling straight into her eyes. “Tell me you are not! Please let me come back to the cafe outside the museum in an hour’s time and buy you all an ice-cream? Then I shall know that you’ve forgiven me!”

  Morag hesitated and knew, even while she did so, that it was a mistake. “I think it would be better if you didn’t,” she began, but he had already noted her lack of decision.

  “You couldn’t be so cruel as to deny me!” he pleaded. “The children will like to have me there!” He rubbed his hand through Kimon’s hair. “Don’t I buy you the best ice-creams ?” he asked him.

  “I suppose so,” Kimon confirmed. He ducked away from his cousin. “But Daddy doesn’t like us to eat too much between meals,” he added somewhat primly.

  “Then I shall come and sit at the next-door table and hope you take pity on me!” Takis declared. He watched them climb out of the car, his eyes dancing with amusement “See you then!” he laughed and, with a wave of his hand, he was gone.

  Morag frowned after him, but there was nothing to be done and so with a slight shrug of her shoulders she put him to the back of her mind and walked with the children through the formal gardens that led to the National Museum.

  “Are you sure you’ll be all right?” she fussed as she bought their tickets and gave them each some money to buy postcards or anything else they wanted.

  “Of course we shall be!” Peggy insisted.

  Kimon nodded. “We know what we want to see, you see,” he pointed out. “I want to look at any coins I can find and Peggy wants to make a drawing of the little Jockey now that they’ve found the horse and mounted him on it. He does look rather super - much younger than we are!”

  Morag, who had seen the statue when she had visited the museum before she had met any of the Holmes, was surprised. “I didn’t know you liked to draw,” she said to Peggy.

  “Well, Grandma didn’t like me to talk about it,” the small girl explained, “but since she’s started painting again, she doesn’t mind my wasting my time drawing things half so much. She looked at some I’d done the other day and told me quite a lot of useful things to help me get the perspective right. She wasn’t cross at all!”

  “Wasn’t she?” Morag smiled with real pleasure. “She must t
hink you’re good if she took the trouble to look at your work. She hasn’t much time for the second-rate.”

  “No,” Peggy agreed with all the assurance of one who knew that there was no danger of her every being considered that. “But I’m not as good as she is. She’s done a beautiful painting of you!”

  “Of me?”

  “Yes,” said Kimon. “She showed it to us while you were getting married in England. It looks quite like you, only I haven’t seen you looking dreamy like she has. She said you looked like that when you thought about Daddy.”

  Morag was completely disconcerted. She longed to question them longer, but their impatience to be gone was so obvious that she hadn’t the heart to keep them. “I’ll be back in one hour exactly,” she told them. “Yes, all right. Don’t fuss, Morag!”

  Conscious that she was doing exactly that, Morag went out of the building again, reminding herself that, unlike herself, they both spoke excellent Greek and could always ask someone if they couldn’t find their way back to the main doors. It would be far more difficult for her to manage her shopping than it would be for them to spend an hour on their own in the museum.

  She walked down one of the main streets that went between Omonia and Syntagma Squares, shamelessly window-shopping. She thought she was justified in buying herself a new dress. She had not discussed money with Pericles, and she had no idea whether he eventually intended to make her some kind of an allowance, or whether she would have to ask him whenever she was in need. But this money was her own. She had brought it with her to finance her trip through Greece and she had only spent very little of it. It cost her nothing to live at Dora’s villa beyond her few personal needs. Then the idea had come to her that she would buy herself a new dress. It had to be no ordinary dress, but something very special, something that would flatter her into a kind of beauty. She had not forgotten how Pericles had looked at her that evening that she had worn her green dress and she wanted badly for him to look at her like that again. Not even Delia’s best efforts to divert his attention to herself had quite succeeded that evening. If, Morag thought, she could find herself a truly splendid dress, perhaps he would look at her again in the same way, he might even want to kiss her again, kiss her as he had not kissed her ever since their wedding.