The Temptation of Torilla by Barbara Cartland

it intolerably disloyal of the man she was to marry to kiss somebody else.
    “What you feel and what Beryl feels are two very different things,” the Marquis remarked.
    He had read her thoughts and Torilla looked at him in a startled fashion.
    “I make no apologies, no excuses for what happened,” he continued in a low voice.
    It was impossible for her to take her eyes from his.
    Then with an effort Torilla remembered who he was and turned her face away.
    “When I came into the salon yesterday, I saw you look at me and I knew that for one second you were glad to see me. Then your eyes changed and you looked at me with what I can only describe as hatred. Why?”
    Torilla drew in her breath.
    How could he have watched her so closely? she wondered. How could he be so sensitive to what she was feeling?
    This was the Marquis of Havingham, the man whose callousness and brutality were responsible for such crimes against nature that she had wished him dead ever since she had gone to Barrowfield.
    Distraught by her feeling she found they had walked to where in the Park a tree had fallen down.
    Without really thinking what she was doing Torilla sat down on the trunk, and the Marquis with his eyes on her face sat beside her.
    His horse had followed them and now once again the stallion put his head down seeking the young grass.
    “I want an explanation, Torilla,” the Marquis said. “Your eyes are very expressive, so it will be difficult for you to keep any secrets from me.”
    “I would – rather you did not – question me.”
    “I knew that was what you felt when we dined together,” the Marquis replied. “But the situation has now changed. What you feel now has something to do with me personally, has it not?”
    “Yes.”
    The monosyllable seemed to be drawn from between Torilla’s lips.
    “And it is not simply that you are angry because I kissed you?”
    “I was not – angry,” Torilla faltered. “I was only – sh-shocked after I realised when you came here yesterday that Sir Alexander Abdy was you!”
    “But there is something else as well,” the Marquis insisted.
    Torilla did not speak and after a moment he went on,
    “You said you had been praying for Beryl in the Church. Did you pray that she should not marry me?”
    Again Torilla was startled that he should be almost clairvoyant where she was concerned, and because he seemed to mesmerise her into telling him the truth, she answered in a low voice,
    “Yes – I did – pray for that.”
    “I wonder which of my many sins and indiscretions have caught up with me? There are quite a number which I imagine you, of all people, would find unpalatable.”
    Now he was speaking mockingly and he was, Torilla felt, laughing at her.
    As if she felt it was intolerable that they should go on with this conversation, she rose from the fallen tree.
    “I wish to go – back to The Hall, my Lord.”
    The Marquis did not rise, he merely put out his hand and caught her wrist.
    “Not until you have told me what I want to know.”
    Torilla felt herself quiver at his touch.
    She did not understand why, but she felt almost as if little shafts of lightning shot through her body because his fingers were touching her skin.
    “Tell me, Torilla. You cannot leave me in suspense and I trust you not to lie to me.”
    “You will – not like the – truth.”
    “I am not afraid to hear it.”
    She tried to pull her wrist free, but the Marquis held her captive and now, looking away from him to where the morning sun was glinting on the lake, she said in a low voice that he could hardly hear,
    “I come from – Barrowfield!”
    “Barrowfield?” the Marquis repeated.
    She knew by the questioning tone in his voice that the name seemed to mean nothing to him.
    He might have forgotten or it might be a place that he found it hard to connect with her.
    Whatever the reason, it swept away Torilla’s hesitation and timidity and the anger and hatred she had felt was stronger than the feeling