The Reluctant Governess. Anne Mather

unhappy experience at the station, and now this strange and deserted castle were all combining to create within her a kind of nightmarish horror, and for several moments she felt petrified.

      But the moment passed, as all moments eventually do; the dogs were not growling any longer, the fire burned brightly, and there were no shadows when she looked again at the gallery.

      With determination, she began to move towards the fire. If she was to have any kind of a life here at all she must get used to these great hulking creatures. She was not naturally afraid of dogs although she had never had anything to do with them before, and who was it who had said that the larger the animal the gentler it was? She swallowed hard. Obviously they must have been talking of domestic animals, for who could consider a rhinoceros a gentle beast? And after all, these were domestic animals, not ravening wolves from the upper slopes of the Rockies. They looked up again at her approach, but at least they did not growl now and she wondered if that was a good sign.

      The heat from that cheerful blaze was penetrating and in no time she was loosening her coat and jacket and feeling her fingers tingle with warmth. She was shrugging out of her sheepskin coat when there was a sound behind her, and turning she confronted an elderly woman dressed all in black, her skirts almost reaching her ankles. Her grey hair was secured in a bun, but there were roses in her cheeks and she looked friendly enough.

      ‘Guten Abend, fräulein,’ she said, with a smile. ‘Come! You would like to see your room, yes?’

      Victoria was so relieved that the woman spoke English that she nodded enthusiastically. ‘My—my luggage—--’ she began, but the woman shook her head.

      ‘Gustav will attend to that, fräulein. Come! All is prepared.’

      Victoria collected her coat and bag, cast a thoughtful glance at the wolfhounds, and then followed the older woman. To her surprise they did not climb the staircase from the hall, but went instead through the door the Baron had used earlier which Victoria now found led into a wide passageway. At the end of the passage there were lights and the smell of cooking, and she guessed it was the kitchen area. But a little further along the passage was a door which when Maria, as Victoria supposed the woman to be, opened it revealed a winding staircase.

      They followed this spiral staircase up two flights to a narrow landing. There were three doors opening on to the landing and Victoria was tempted to ask who else used this section of the castle but she restrained herself in time. Maria flung open one door and indicated that Victoria should enter. She did so, not without foreboding, for she was not yet rid of that unreal feeling she had experienced, and she had an awful premonition that Maria might thrust her inside and lock the door. But despite her ridiculous fears, nothing unforeseen happened and in fact she found the room quite attractive. In the passageway and coming up the stairs she had not felt the cold, she had been too engrossed with her own imagination, but now she was glad of the glowing logs in the hearth at the far side of the bedroom and moved towards them compulsively, holding out her hands.

      ‘The bathroom is downstairs,’ remarked Maria, with a trace of reluctance, as though she considered it unnecessary to discuss such matters. ‘There’ll be a meal ready for you in fifteen minutes if you come down to the kitchen, fräulein.’

      ‘Thank you.’ Victoria managed a smile. ‘Tell me, when will I meet the—er—Baroness and—and Sophie?’

      ‘You haven’t seen Sophie yet?’ queried Maria, with a shrug. ‘Ach, ach! The child is somewhere about. You will see her in good time.’ She turned to go.

      Victoria took a step forward. ‘And—and the Baroness …’ she prompted.

      Maria frowned. ‘Baroness von Reichstein isn’t here,’ she muttered, with even more reluctance.

      ‘Not here?’ Victoria frowned. ‘Then—who is here?’

      Maria’s features softened. ‘You are here, fräulein, and I am here, and Gustav is here, and the Herr Baron is here.’

      Victoria was aghast. Her godmother would be horrified to discover that apart from Maria there was to be no other woman in the house. Heavens, thought Victoria wryly, she was aghast herself. No wonder the other governesses had found the place isolated. Who would there be to talk to? The Baron? Maria? Or Gustav? Or the child, Sophie? She swallowed hard, and as she did so she realised that since leaving the train at Reichstein she had not once thought of Meredith Hammond!

      ‘Is that all, fräulein?’ Maria was waiting to go.

      ‘Oh—oh yes, thank you.’ Victoria nodded, unable to assimilate these new facts immediately. ‘I—I’ll come down when I’m ready.’

      ‘Jawohl, fräulein!’ Maria smiled and withdrew, and as the door closed Victoria sank down rather weakly on to the bed. As downstairs, the lights were electric, but as she sat there they flickered rather unsteadily for a moment and she shivered again. The journey, her arrival, her surroundings, and most of all the lack of people was unnerving to contemplate, and she had the most ridiculous desire to bury her face on her pillow and cry her eyes out. But that would never do. She was not a defeatist, was she? Surely she was allowing everything to get out of hand. At least the bed felt superbly comfortable and after a night’s sleep surely everything would look brighter …

       CHAPTER TWO

      VICTORIA rolled over restlessly, gathering the bedclothes closer about her as her movements caused a slight chill to invade the warmth beneath. She was dreaming and the dream was frightening in its clarity. She was running down a steep, snow-covered slope, pursued by hounds whose bared teeth and slavering jowls were inches behind her. They made awful sounds of heavy breathing, panting in her ears until she ran so fast that she felt her lungs would burst. And then she lost her footing and tumbled headlong down the slope, slipping and sliding, and grappling for something to save herself from certain death. Panic penetrated her being, biting particles of snow blinded her, and she tossed about frenziedly, seeking escape from the disaster ahead of her, and then an explosion somewhere outside her realm of fantasy aroused her to a real awareness of her surroundings.

      With a gasp, she sat up abruptly in the bed, pressing a hand to her throat to still her racing pulse, and remained absolutely still for a moment, recovering from the shock of her awakening. As full consciousness invaded her mind, she realised that the room was no longer dark as it had been the night before. Light was penetrating the heavy velvet curtains, the brilliant sun-on-snow light that was eloquent of the mountains.

      A shiver engulfed her and swiftly she reached for the quilted housecoat she had laid on the end of the bed the night before. Thrusting her arms into it, she saw that her fire was dead, the ashes not even glowing in the hearth, and the room was as chill as a refrigerator. With hasty movements, she fastened the housecoat and slid out of bed, brushing her hair out of her eyes with an unsteady hand. She was still very much aware of the nightmare world of the dream and the remembrance of the explosion which had woken her seemed altogether more substantial than all the rest.

      Shivering once more, she pushed aside the velvet curtains and looked out. Last night the landscape had been a white wilderness, but this morning the brilliance of the panorama hurt her eyes. Her window overlooked the rear of the castle, and towering above were the high reaches of the mountains. Closer at hand the pines were loaded with snow beyond a walled garden in which some attempt at cultivation had obviously been achieved. Away to the right the surging waters of the stream could be glimpsed, and she wondered with incredulity how it remained unfrozen in such low temperatures. The surroundings of the valley might account for some shelter, but even so it was very cold.

      As normality asserted itself, Victoria turned and lifted her watch from the table by the bed. It was only a little after eight, but she decided she would be well advised to put on her clothes and go and find some heating. She was pulling on thick trousers when a sound at her bedroom door brought her swinging round to face it, grabbing her sweater to hide her chest. The door creaked,