Free The Cruel Count (Bantam Series No. 28) by Barbara Cartland Page A

she exclaimed. “I felt certain we should find them here.”
    She tasted one. It was sweet and warm from the sunshine. Then she picked a handful and carried them to where the Count had sat down with his back to the trunk of a tree, the sliced chicken at his side.
    Vesta put the strawberries down on the paper in which it had been wrapped and said:
    “I will find some more later. Let us eat the chicken first.”
    “If I were a better naturalist,” the Count said, “I would doubtless be able to find you some wild lettuce. I see that my education has been sadly neglected when it comes to the flora of my own country.”
    “I was thinking when I first arrived,” Vesta said, “that I must learn more about herbs that grow in Katona.”
    “Why?” he enquired.
    “Mama is very knowledgeable on such subjects as herbal medicines, salves and lotions,” Vesta replied. “We have a herb garden at home. It was laid out in the reign of Henry VIII.”
    She took a bite of the chicken and went on:
    “Now this would have been much improved if I could have found some Basil. I wonder what the right word for it is in Katonian.”
    “You will have to find a book on cookery,” the Count said.
    “Is there a large library at the Palace?” Vesta asked.
    “Quite a comprehensive one,” the Count replied. “The late Prince Andreas, His Royal Highness’s father, was a great reader.”
    “That will be wonderful for me,” Vesta said, “but first I must improve my knowledge of your language.”
    “You obviously intend to settle in and stay here,” the Count remarked.
    A flush rose to her cheeks as she said angrily:
    “Are you still intent on sending me home? You are very persistent, but I am as determined as you are that nothing will induce me to leave.”
    “Nothing?” he enquired.
    “Only if the Prince was dead,” she answered. “Do you imagine the Revolutionaries might kill him?”
    The Count shrugged his shoulders. Then he asked: “Would it sadden you very much?”
    The question was a surprise and Vesta replied: “Naturally ... I should be ... upset.”
    “Because you had lost a husband you had never seen?”
    She would have answered him, but she had the feeling that he was deliberately trying to make her feel uncomfortable.
    “I think, Count,” she said, “that once again you are encroaching on matters which do not concern you.”
    She tried to speak with great dignity but it was rather difficult when they were sitting side by side in the middle of the wood sharing pieces of chicken, and she was conscious that her hair had been blown by the breeze around her cheeks.
    There was a glint of amusement in his eyes before he said:
    “You are very severe, Ma’am.”
    “I am trying to behave ... correctly,” Vesta replied, “and you are not making it ... very easy for ... me.”
    “Then I must apologise in all sincerity,” he answered.
    For once she thought he was not speaking mockingly, and looking away from him she said:
    “I cannot help feeling lonely and a little ... homesick. When the ship sailed away it was my last link with England, and I am trying ... hard to like everything in Katona since it will in future be my ... home.”
    She tried to speak unemotionally but there was a perceptible quiver in her voice. After a moment the Count said in a tone which he had never used to her before:
    “You must forgive me if my attitude has made things more difficult for you than they would have been otherwise.”
    Vesta had always found it hard to bear a grudge when people apologised for anything they had said or done.
    She gave the Count a shy little smile. Then she rose to her feet saying:
    “I will try and find more strawberries. I am sure there must be some over there in the sunshine.”
    She moved away from him and he watched her as she went from the shade of the trees out into the sunshine where she had noticed there were flowers.
    She was right: for nestling beneath their green leaves there was quite a profusion of