Apollo's Seed. Anne Mather

Martha seemed to recall that his name was Spiros or Spiro, she wasn’t certain which, but there had been so many names to remember, so many employees, who seemed to count it an honour to work for the Myconos family. And it was a family, in every sense of the word, a close-knit family, welded together by Aristotle Myconos’ influence, where sons—and daughters-in-law, daughters—and sons-in-law, all came within the suffocating circle of his omnipotence. Maybe, if she and Dion had had a home of their own, things would have been different, she mused, and then squashed the thought. Aristotle had not been to blame for Dion’s possessiveness, his absurd jealousy, his desire to confine his wife within the web of his family, and destroy all connections with her own …

      Nothing could prevent her nerves from tightening as the limousine turned between the stone gateposts of the villa. There were no iron fortifications here, as there were at the villa in Athens. No visible guards, no burglar-proof locks to keep out intruders. The main access to the island was through the harbour, but just in case, Aristotle had the coastline patrolled both day and night.

      Thick shrubs hid all but the roof of the villa as the car followed the winding curve of the drive, but eventually they emerged before its white-painted façade, and Martha saw again the imposing entrance of Dion’s island home. She remembered the first time she had seen it. She had been enchanted then—enchanted and bemused, that a man like Dionysus Myconos should want her for his wife.

      The car stopped, and Alex thrust open his door to get out. The chauffeur alighted and opened Martha’s door, and with a feeling of unease she stepped out on to the gravelled forecourt.

      It was slightly cooler here than in Rhodes, the soft breeze bringing a pleasant relief in the heat of the day. Yet the smell was the same, that tangy citrus smell, that mingled here with the salty taste of the sea. And it was quiet, so quiet after the noisy harbour at Rhodes, without even the peal of voices to disturb the stillness. She had thought Dion’s older sister, Helene, might be there, with her two sons, but there were no voices echoing from the pool as there would have been if there were children about.

      ‘My father is in his study,’ Alex said, at her elbow, and she looked up at him anxiously.

      ‘Is no one else here?’

      ‘You forget—I told you, my sister is getting married on Friday. The family are gathering in Athens for the celebrations.’

      ‘Oh, yes.’ Martha had forgotten. ‘Well, shall we get it over with?’

      Alex raised his dark eyebrows, but he made no comment, merely led the way beneath the marble pillars, and into the cool, spacious hall.

      Martha had forgotten the long windows at the back of the hall, which gave a magnificent view of the curve of the hillside, stretching up to the mellowed walls of the monastery. The hall itself was on two levels, with an iron-railed balcony providing an oasis of plants in the heart of the building. Alabaster balusters supported the rail of the staircase, that curved to the upper storey, and overhead a crystal chandelier glinted dully below the arch of the ceiling.

      Aristotle’s study was some distance from the entrance hall, along corridors that gave tantalising glimpses of the sea between stone panels. The Aegean lay below them, somnolent in the noonday sun, a deeper blue than the sky above. It was so beautiful here, she thought with a pang. If only people were like places!

      Her knees were knocking as they reached the leather-studded door, and in a spurt of panic she decided to dismiss any other motive she might have had for coming here. She would speak to Dion’s father on Roger’s behalf, and that was all. If he refused, she had done her best, and no one could do more. So far as her feelings towards Josy were concerned, they would have to wait. Maybe back in England, with the journey behind her, she would be able to view things less emotionally, but right now she wanted to turn and run, and that was not the frame of mind in which to come to a rational decision.

      Alex knocked, and then gave her a faintly appealing look. It was as if for a moment he regretted their estrangement as much as she did, and impulsively, she put her fingers on his arm taut beneath the fine material of his suit.

      ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, with a little rush of nostalgia. ‘I did miss you, Alex—honestly!’

      His lips were parting to make some response, when the door beside them opened. In that moment they were frozen in their adopted attitudes, caught for that fleeting split second in time, like two lovers planning an assignation. Then Martha’s head turned, her hand dropped away, and her eyes widened in chilling disbelief as she gazed up at the man confronting them. This was not Aristotle Myconos, not this tall man, with thin, slightly haggard features, and a lean, loose-limbed body. Aristotle was more like Alex, shorter, stockier, greyer—although this man’s dark hair was liberally sprinkled with that betraying filament. Besides, this man was younger, too young to have sired four grown sons and two daughters, yet like Alex, he too had suffered badly from the passage of years. His eyes seemed darker, deeper-set, his cheeks hollower, his frame more angular, thinner. This man was Dionysus Myconos, her husband, yet not her husband, but the man she had least wanted to meet.

       CHAPTER TWO

      SHE had misunderstood Alex’s appealing look, she thought bitterly, trying to maintain some semblance of composure. It was sympathy, not understanding, she had glimpsed in his face, and she was tempted to turn on him angrily, scorning the lies he had told her to get her here. He had said Dion was in Amsterdam—or had he? All he had actually said was that he had gone there two days before.

      ‘Will you not come in, Martha?’ intoned her husband now, his voice as cold as the censure in his eyes. ‘Alex, we will talk later.’

      ‘Yes …’

      Alex turned away, but not before he had given Martha another of those reluctantly compassionate looks, though she was too intent on the interview ahead to notice it. With a stiffening of her backbone she stalked past her husband into the room, and then stopped short at the sight of her father-in-law, seated behind his square mahogany desk. Somehow she had expected Dion to be alone, and her step faltered as she heard her husband close the heavy door behind them.

      ‘Martha!’ Aristotle Myconos got heavily to his feet, and she saw he limped as he came round the desk to greet her. Like his sons he had aged, but although she eyed him warily, there was nothing but polite courtesy in his eyes. ‘I am so glad you agreed to come here. As you can see, I am not so young as I used to be, and I leave most of the legwork to my sons these days.’

      ‘I’m sorry.’ Martha’s response was clipped, but she couldn’t help it. Whichever way she looked at it, she had been tricked, and she didn’t like it.

      ‘Please …’ Aristotle indicated a dark green leather armchair, placed to one side of his desk. ‘Will you not sit down? I realise you are feeling we have deceived you, but it was not reasonable for you to expect me not to tell Dion about your letter.’

      Martha drew a deep breath. She was at a distinct disadvantage here. Before her was this old man, looking every one of his sixty-odd years, and behind her, boring into her shoulder blades, was the malevolent gaze of her husband. What was Dion doing here? What did he have to say to her? And why did she have the feeling she had been manipulated once again?

      Composing her words carefully, she said: ‘I told Alex I didn’t want to come here. What we have to say to one another could have been said just as well in a letter——’

      ‘Could it?’

      The harsh tones that interrupted her were so unlike Alex’s that Martha wondered how she could ever have mistaken them, however briefly. As she clutched her handbag as a sort of lifeline, Dion strode from the door to join his father, standing before the desk, feet slightly apart, arms folded across the muscled leanness of his chest. Like his brother and his father, he too was wearing formal clothes, but the dark colours he chose accentuated the alien cast of his skin, and clung to the narrow outline of his hips.

      Facing