‘Most of the plantation owners built their homes on the Atlantic side of the island,’ Zach explained when Tamara commented on the uninhabited landscape. ‘It was considered to be healthier and less likely to be attacked by pirates.’
His face seemed to relax a little as he spoke to her, the bones softening a little from their previous fixed rigidity, and then the Land Rovers started to climb up towards the restaurant.
Made of wood, its original green paint had long ago faded to a dull olive, and inside, despite the overhead fans, the air was thick and clammy. Tamara had never felt less like food, and while the other members of the party settled themselves at the long trestle tables she went back outside, finding it both cooler and fresher.
‘Not hungry?’
She hadn’t realised that Zach Fletcher had followed her, but shook her head mutely, unwilling to admit to the momentary weakness which had overcome her inside the restaurant.
‘Me neither.’
The admission surprised her and her expression betrayed the fact. ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked grimly. ‘Aren’t insensitive brutes like me allowed to have normal feelings?’
‘I never said …’ Tamara began defensively, but he cut her short, and mocked, ‘You never said, no. You didn’t need to, those eyes of yours say it all. Quite a contradiction, aren’t you? On the one hand we have the modern, liberated young woman, holidaying apart from her … fiancé, and yet those eyes could belong to a sheltered novice, with no more idea of modern mores than a babe in arms.’
‘If you’ll excuse me, I’ve decided that I’ll have something to eat after all,’ Tamara said pointedly, brushing past him, but once inside the restaurant she could do no more than drink a glass of lemonade and toy with the salad she had ordered.
It was after two o’clock when their guide preceded them along one of the paths leading from the restaurant up into the mountains.
Within half an hour Tamara was perspiring heavily, glad of her cotton tee-shirt, and she wasn’t the only one. Everyone seemed to be feeling the effects of the intense humidity, even, to her surprise, Zach Fletcher, whose shirt front was dark as his perspiration soaked into it, and yet unlike the other men he made no move to either roll up the long sleeves or discard the shirt altogether. Perhaps it was because he knew how darkly attractive he looked in the black shirt and pants, Tamara thought acidly, instantly dismissing the thought as stupid; he wasn’t the sort of man who needed to attract female attention by dressing dramatically; even in the same type of floral bermudas and shirts favoured by some of the more flamboyant guests, any woman worthy of the name would give him a second look.
The deeper they progressed into the forest, the more closely entwined were the trees; mahogany predominant among them; vines twining chokingly around them, dead and decaying vegetation lining the forest floor, the sweet rotting smell making Tamara long for a breath of clean, fresh air. Once or twice their guide stopped to point out to them an orchid, growing among the rampant greenery, and occasionally the laboured sound of their breathing was broken by the shrill screech of a parrot, although they never actually glimpsed the birds. On several occasions they could hear the sound of water, but they never came in sight of any of the streams which the guide told them ran through the forest, with apparently spectacular waterfalls in places.
Tamara regre
tted her decision to join the walk; there was something oppressive and unwholesome about the forest and its environs, something that made her flinch and long to be out in the open once more.
At her side Zach seemed to be having no problem in keeping up with the others, despite his claim that he was recuperating from an accident, but at one point when the guide called a halt and Sue shrieked out suddenly when she caught sight of a small lizard, Tamara, who had been looking in Zach’s direction, saw him pale suddenly beneath his tan, perspiration beading his skin, his fingers curling into his thigh.
‘Are you all right?’ Her low, impulsive question seemed to free him from whatever had held him in its grip, because his face suddenly seemed to relax.
‘Fine,’ he assured her hardily. ‘Come on, I think our guide’s ready.’
They tramped through the forest for over two hours, Tamara steadily growing more and more oppressed by the entwining branches blotting out so much of the sunlight, and the heavy, unreal atmosphere around them. It was almost as though she had stepped into one of the enchanted forests of her childhood, and now, as then, fear mingled with the feeling of unreality.
They had climbed quite steeply, the path sometimes so narrow that they had to walk in single file. At one point, as promised, the rain suddenly started to fall, in saturating sheets which penetrated even the thickness of the vegetation, and the guide, who had come prepared, handed out umbrellas, large enough for two people to shelter under together.
Tamara shared hers with Zach, marvelling at the abruptness with which the rain came and went.
‘It’s something you get used to,’ Zach told her laconically, causing her to comment in surprise, ‘You said you hadn’t been to the Caribbean before.’
‘I haven’t, but one jungle’s very much like another.’
He didn’t say anything more and Tamara had the conviction that subject was not one he wished to take any further. For some reason they seemed to have been teamed together for the walk possibly because everyone else was already with somebody, and she wished passionately that she had never decided to participate in the walk. She didn’t like the atmosphere pervading the forest and she didn’t like the prickles of awareness she experienced every time some inadvertent movement brought her into physical contact with Zach Fletcher.
He glanced at his watch and frowned.
‘We ought to be heading back. There’s no dusk as we know it at home here. Another couple of hours and it will be fully dark.’
He walked forward, catching hold of the guide’s arm, and spoke to him. The guide shook his head vehemently.
‘No turn back yet,’ he told Zach. ‘Soon, but not yet. Not much further now,’ he added with the air of a commander urging his flagging troops to greater effort.
‘How much further can “not much” be?’ Sue groaned when they had walked for another fifteen minutes. ‘I’m bushed!’
Tamara could only agree. She felt hot and sticky and was longing for a cooling shower. Perspiration had darkened the front of her hair, and her mouth felt dry. She was also beginning to regret the lunch she had refused, distinct pangs of hunger assailing her. She had some biscuits in her bag, but it was too much effort to put it down and search for them. Everyone else seemed tired too; everyone, that was, apart from Zach, who despite the sweat stains marring his shirt, still seemed able to keep up with their guide without flagging.
Ahead of her Tamara saw the guide stop. They had reached a small clearing where a fallen tree had created a tiny space.