Julius always knew when he was seriously upset: he went off coffee. Instead of deliciously rich, it tasted bitter and heavy and nauseating. He sat and stared at the large cup of it he had just made, and after one sip, carried it over to the sink and poured it away, watching it, too miserable even to move.
What could he do? It was ridiculous, really, to overreact like this to Nell’s increasingly high-handed, almost dismal behaviour. He had always known that Nell had her own life, and she would continue to do so. He couldn’t imagine anything worse than having a wife who simply kept house and bought clothes and gave dinner parties. Jillie had an important career, of course – no, Julius, don’t start thinking about Jillie. She belonged in the past – this awful, sickly, coffee-tainted misery was about Nell, not Jillie. Although exactly what about her was making him miserable, he couldn’t quite work out.
He decided to go for a drive; driving always helped him to think. He climbed into the Bentley and set off southwards across London, down through Regent’s Park; winding down his window as he always did, the better to hear the strange medley of noises coming from the zoo, the roars and high-pitched screeches.
It was a beautiful day and he had no idea where he was going, but found himself driving across Putney Bridge, and thence onto the A30, and eventually into Guildford and then out again up onto the Hog’s Back: where he stopped with a lurch of his heart, for it was one of the Sunday drives he had done with Jillie, and he had managed to park in almost exactly the same place.
He suddenly saw Jillie absolutely clearly, her long straight brown hair, her green eyes, her narrow face with its high cheekbones, her slender body. He could hear her now too, her light, very clear voice, her delicious laugh. God, Julius, just stop it, you’re hallucinating, get back to reality – you need to see Nell, actually see her, remind yourself about her. You’re going to marry Nell, you want to marry Nell – yes, you do. He got back into the car, turned it round and retraced his steps, made for Nell’s house in Kensington.
‘Diana, it’s me. Leo Bennett.’
‘Ah! Would that be the Leo Bennett, three times divorced, no current girlfriend – married, devoted girlfriend presently sobbing into her lace-trimmed hanky?’
‘Diana—’
‘Because I have absolutely no interest in the latter, I’m so sorry.’
She put the phone down; it rang again immediately.
‘Leo, you must be either deaf or very stupid.’
‘I’m not deaf, but possibly – probably – very stupid. Look – could I come and see you later, say around six? I really can explain. And I so want to see you. Oh, and Celia doesn’t have any lace-trimmed hankies. Just embroidered.’
It was that last that made her relent. He was funny and she liked funny men. Maybe there was some kind of satisfactory explanation – although it was hard to think what.
‘All right. Make it six thirty, though, I’m going out for lunch.’
This was quite untrue, but what kind of girl had absolutely nothing to do on a Sunday? A boring one. And then she thought that if she was concerned that Leo might consider her boring, she must fancy him a little at least …
‘I’ve had the most marvellous piece of news,’ said Ned. His mother had phoned to say she was coming up to London the following week; having said that, there was a hopeful silence, which meant, he knew, that she was hoping to be invited to meet his new friend. And what an inadequate description that was for the person who had turned his life around, made him happier than he would ever have dreamed.
He determinedly ignored the silence, or rather its message. ‘It’s all through Jillie, really,’ he said. ‘We’ve managed to become friends again and her uncle is a chief consultant in obstetrics, as you know.’
‘And … ?’
‘Jillie saw him yesterday, and told him I’d resigned from St Luke’s, and why, and about my campaign to have the mothers in the wards and he mentioned they had a vacancy for a consultant paediatrician, and he and various other doctors had been discussing the care of children in hospital and holding a conference on the subject. I’ve got to go and meet him, of course, but it looks as if there could be a happy ending to all this – including for the children.’
‘Darling, I’m delighted for you,’ said Persephone. ‘Delighted and proud. Well, you deserve it, you’ve been so brave about everything. Let’s hope that from now on everything’s going to be much easier for you. Now, darling—’
‘Mother, I’m sorry, I’ve got to go. I’m already late for my clinic …’
Persephone sighed as she put down the phone. She was so longing to meet this young man, whoever he was. Well, she supposed it would happen some time …
Patrick had arrived back in London earlier than he expected and decided that he really wanted to see Jillie. He felt that with increasing frequency. He rang from a call box on Euston Station to see if she was home; she wasn’t, but her mother assured him she soon would be; she’d gone to see a friend in hospital, but had said she would be back in time for lunch. Patrick looked at the station clock and saw that it was half past three; Geraldine Curtis said half apologetically they always had lunch at four at the earliest on Sundays and asked if he would like to join them.
Patrick said that would be very nice and hurried to the taxi rank and a very long queue.
Julius felt better now, back in London, driving up Kensington High Street; the madness that had overtaken him on the Hog’s Back had almost passed. What had he been thinking of? Dreaming of Jillie Curtis, who the last time he had spoken to her, begging her to meet him, had told him to go away and never come near her again, and then put the phone down on him.
‘You can’t marry him,’ said Seth Gilbert, lying back contentedly in Nell’s brass bed and reaching for his cigarettes. ‘You don’t love him, he irritates you to death, and besides, now you’ve got me.’
‘Well,’ said Nell briskly, ‘I haven’t exactly got you, have I? Except as a very thrilling lover.’ She leaned over and kissed him. ‘You’re married, you’ve got children, and we hardly know one another. In three months’ time we could loathe each other.’
‘Unlikely, I’d say.’
‘Be fun finding out, though.’
‘But what I really meant was, you’re not behaving too much like someone who’s about to be married. And you must tell him, poor chap, that you don’t want to marry him. I feel quite sorry for him.’
‘Yes, I will tell him. Not about you – don’t look so alarmed. Just that I can’t marry him. But not just yet. I can’t face it.’
‘You’re a funny girl,’ said Seth, pulling her down onto him again. ‘Wonderfully funny. Now look, how about one for the road? We’ve just about got time –’ He looked at his watch. ‘Half past three, come on, you know you want to … I can see it on your face …’
Julius let himself into Nell’s house very quietly. If she was working, she got very cross if he made a noise. She would probably be cross anyway, but if he explained that he’d really had to see her and that he wasn’t going to stay, she’d be perfectly happy.
He looked into her little study, which was a shambles as always, sheets of typescript all over the desk, and one half-typed sheet actually in the typewriter. Although it was strictly forbidden, he read what she was typing; it was set in an operating theatre, tracing the heroine’s thoughts as she made her first incision into the patient’s abdomen. He was a little surprised that it stopped mid-sentence; normally she hated not completing a chapter even. Something quite serious must have distracted her: a visitor perhaps, but no, she just wouldn’t have opened the door; no one, not just he, was allowed to disturb her Sundays. Anyway, she wasn’t reading in the little sitting room with the French windows open to the tiny terraced garden, or even the dining room, with its pretty round table covered in a lace cloth and the collection of blue and white china he had given her in a glass-fronted case.
Maybe she was having a rest; it was unlike her, but she had been very tired recently. He really must speak to her, he thought, about leaving doors and windows open, positively inviting burglars in. He unlaced his shoes and as silently as he could, which was very silently, for he knew every creak in every board of that house, he went up the stairs, tiptoed along the corridor, and very, very carefully opened Nell’s bedroom door.
‘Hello, darling, how are you? How was little Kit?’
‘Oh – pretty good, considering.’
Jillie sat down suddenly; her legs were weary and achy.
‘And Alice?’
‘In a terrible state. Talking about divorcing Tom –’
‘What! Whatever for?’
‘Oh, I told you, he was very difficult about her taking Kit to a private hospital. You know how passionate he is about the National Health Service.’
‘Oh, yes, I saw Josh’s article. Hardly grounds for divorce,’ said Geraldine. ‘She’ll get over it. They both will.’
‘I’m not sure. I hope so. Anyway, sorry if I’m late for lunch –’
‘You’re not, and I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve asked Patrick to join us.’
‘Patrick! Oh, Mummy, why?’
‘Well, he’d just got off the train from some godforsaken place, and he was so disappointed you weren’t here –’
‘I don’t know why. Honestly, Mummy, I’m not feeling very sociable.’
‘Well, it’s too late now, he’s on his way in a taxi.’
Jillie sighed. ‘As long as he doesn’t start talking about the latest gastroenteric virus –’
‘Jillie, that’s unfair. He has a very broad spectrum of conversation in my experience.’
‘Well, perhaps you’d better start going out with him – no, sorry, I’m quite fond of him really, I’ll go and brush my hair and make myself look a bit better.’
Actually, she thought it would be good to see Patrick; he was so nice and steady and normal, didn’t have emotional crises every five minutes. And it had been quite a difficult few days, seeing Ned for the first time since – well, since. Yes, he definitely did have advantages. She not only brushed her hair but also put on a new dress, a blue cotton shirtwaister, and some lipstick, and sprayed herself with Guerlain’s Jicky which was her current favourite and which Patrick had admired last time they went out.
She was just walking down the stairs when there was a crunch on the gravel as a taxi drove in. She ran down the last few steps, opened the front door and, rather to her own surprise, instead of shaking his hand, hugged Patrick and gave him a kiss.
Julius was halfway along Piccadilly when he realised he had left his shoes behind; his foot slipped on the brake and he only just avoided hitting a bus coming in the other direction.
It didn’t seem to matter; nothing seemed to matter, except getting to Jillie’s house. If she was working, he would drive out to Hackney and find her there. He had to find her, be with her; that emotion wiped out any anger or humiliation at the scene that had greeted him as he opened Nell’s bedroom door, Nell pushing some man off her, and struggling to a sitting position, the sheet hugged to her chin.
Julius said nothing, nothing at all, nor did he wait to hear anything they might have to say; he just wanted to get away from them.
At Piccadilly Circus he pulled in to the side, just by Swan & Edgar’s, and pulled off his socks, bare feet being indubitably safer, and proceeded up Regent Street, and then Portland Place, and thence Camden High Street, and on northwards, until at last he was in Highbury, and there, there on his right, at long last, number five. Number five, containing Jillie, happiness, safety. He had paused, wondering how he was going to get across the gravel in his bare feet, when a taxi came up behind him and drove into the drive. And as Julius watched, a man got out, the man he recognised from the other night at the restaurant – and walked up the steps to the front door, and before he had even raised his hand to the knocker, the door opened and Jillie appeared, hugged him – albeit briefly, and gave him a kiss and then shut the great door firmly. Julius sat there for at least half an hour, trying to establish which of his emotions was the most painful, and then turned the Bentley round and drove very slowly home.