‘Well, that’s all splendid, Mr Welles. We shall be delighted to have you on board. We’re short on paediatric skills at the moment; Lionel Mainwaring has retired early, due to ill health, poor fellow, just as his research programme on childhood leukaemia was launched. But I believe that is one of your spheres of clinical interest.’
‘It is indeed. I have been following Mr Mainwaring’s work with great interest.’
‘Good, good. And we are very much in agreement with you over children’s hospitalisation, and the presence of mothers on the wards. There are considerable practical problems, but I don’t think it is beyond the ingenuity of man to solve them. My only stricture would be that you proceed with any programme slowly and with great care.’
He really was a good man, Ned thought, Mr William Curtis, MD, BSc (Hons), FRCP, FRCS (Hons) and God knew how many more such letters, this uncle of Jillie: sitting there, smiling at him across his huge desk. To work under his enlightened aegis would not only be an honour, but a pleasure. He said so.
‘The feelings are entirely mutual. Oh, Jillie did tell me, in the briefest possible terms, about the reasons for your engagement’s cessation, and I would like to assure you my only feelings on that are sympathy. Such a lovely girl,’ he added. ‘One of my favourite people, not just in the family but beyond, and extremely clever too. She’ll do very well, I’m sure.’
What he was saying, Ned knew, in the most sensitively expressed code, was that he felt no prejudice towards him for his sexuality, and moreover, given discretion, that he need have no fears of it from anyone else on the hospital staff.
Ned walked out of the hospital and over Westminster Bridge, smiling down at the water, the sun warm on his face. He could never remember feeling so happy, so fortunate. He had the job he had dreamed of, fear removed from his professional life, loneliness from his personal; he loved and was loved. It was a heady sensation.
He decided to walk down to St Luke’s, rather than get a taxi; it would only take about half an hour along the river and he had plenty of time before his afternoon clinic. He would miss his patients there, he thought. He had made friends among them, and their mothers – their fathers were rarely to be seen. It was women’s work, taking children to hospital. There was one little chap, Timmy Ford, the bravest and most cheerful nine-year-old; he had been born with one leg four inches shorter than the other, had had four operations, was in constant pain, and arthritis was already setting in. He had to wear calipers, and a heavily built-up shoe; his mother was always smiling, sometimes trailing one or more of her other four children into the clinic; and then there was Susan Mills, a cystic fibrosis case, also in leg irons, and with both bladder and bowel problems, a cheeky, curious child who called him Dr Make-me-Welles. It was a splendid name that he tried to live up to.
As he walked along Chelsea Embankment, he looked up at the extremely handsome mansion blocks, and thought how much he would like to live there, with the fantastic view of the river and the space they offered – a huge reception room, more than decent kitchen and some had three bedrooms. He could have a study and a proper guest room … And then thought, reckless with happiness, there would be room for a piano and he would be able to put his mother and other visitors up. One was for sale; he noted the name of the agent, and hurried on. It wouldn’t do to be late for his clinic.
‘Are you ready?’
Diana handed Leo Bennett a large gin and tonic, settled herself on the sofa on the opposite side of the fireplace from him, lit a cigarette. She wanted a clear head, not remotely befuddled by alcohol. ‘Go on, Leo, I’m all ears.’
It was Saturday; their assignation the previous week had been cancelled as he had been sent by the paper to Paris to attempt to interview Juliette Gréco about her affair with Miles Davis. He failed, but he did see her perform in Le Tabou, a music and poetry venue on the rue Dauphine, and wrote a rather amusing piece about the evening, the music, bohemian Paris, and hanging about for three hours hoping she would emerge, only to learn she had left quite early while he was in the gents.
‘OK. First, Celia. The one who my friends in the ladies’ lavatory said was still sobbing. It’s her speciality, sobbing. And yes, we did have a fling, not a very long one, which is why I thought it would be all right to finish it.’
‘That sounds a bit – harsh.’
‘I agree. But she’s an emotional girl, almost unstable I’d say –’
‘That sounds harsher.’
‘Sorry. I didn’t realise at the outset. Nor did I realise something else.’
‘What was that? She had some incurable disease?’
‘Diana, that’s hugely unfair. I really don’t think I deserved that. I’m doing my utmost to be honest with you. I don’t normally justify my behaviour in this rather pathetic way.’
‘Well, stop doing it then. I don’t mind. It was your idea. We can go our separate ways right now. Doesn’t matter to me.’
‘Fine.’ He stood up and walked towards the door. Diana looked after him. Even from the back he was attractive, slim, quite broad shouldered, his thick blonde hair beautifully cut, exactly the right length; his Saturday clothes – dark blue jeans, brown Chelsea boots, open-necked white shirt, navy tweed jacket – exactly the style she most liked, and he had a very sexy walk. She suddenly very much wanted him to stay. And –
‘I was being unfair,’ she said. ‘Hugely unfair. I’m sorry.’
She surprised herself with the thoroughness of her apology. She must really like him, she thought.
He turned; he still wasn’t smiling, as she had thought he would be, but he looked less angry.
‘Come back and at least finish your drink. I think I’ll join you.’
He walked back rather slowly and sat down; while she was making her drink, the phone rang. It was Ned.
‘Hello, Ned, darling. Lovely to hear from you. But I’ve got someone here right now, can I ring you back? Um – no, not this afternoon, sorry. Why? Oh, I see. Oh, Ned, what a good idea, they’re lovely those flats, and you are terribly squashed in your cottage, pretty as it is. Right. Well, see if you can arrange something for tomorrow or Monday and let me know.’
She put the phone down, went back to the sofa.
‘Sorry.’
‘Friend of yours?’
‘Yes. Ned Welles, he’s a doctor. You could say he’s my best friend,’ she added, determinedly banishing Tom Knelston from her thoughts.
‘I see. And – is he married?’
‘No. Couple of near-misses, but – no. Not yet.’
‘Oh – hang on a minute. Isn’t he a friend of the Bellingers? And Ludo Manners? I covered some wedding they all went to. And Michael Southcott and the delectable Betsey.’
‘Michael’s my brother.’
‘Really? Nice chap.’
‘Yes, well, I think so. Goodness, what a memory you’ve got.’
‘Fearfully good-looking, your friend,’ said Leo. ‘I always thought he was probably queer. Or certainly swung both ways.’
‘Ned! Heavens, no. I almost married him myself.’
‘And why didn’t you?’
‘Because I met my husband.’
‘From whom you’re now divorced? Tell me, Diana, do you have a vast past?’
‘Not really. Look, I thought we were going to discuss yours.’
‘OK. What was next on the agenda? Oh, yes, Baba.’
‘To whom you’re still married?’
‘Correct.’
‘Why did you tell me you weren’t?’
‘I tell everyone that. It saves a lot of tedious explanations.’
‘All right. Why do you deny your wife’s existence? It’s not the nicest thing to do.’
‘She’s not the nicest person.’
‘Leo –’ Diana was growing irritable now; she took a rather unladylike slug of her gin and tonic.
‘It suits her to be married to me. It goes like this. Marriage a big mistake. Soon dawned on us both. Anyway, we had no children, thank God, we agreed to divorce, and I was living in London anyway. She stayed in a house in the country we’d bought until it all went through. Only it didn’t. She discovered she was very happy in the country without me; there wasn’t anyone else, she just dug her heels in and wouldn’t get on with it. And I had no grounds for divorcing her. I wouldn’t anyway. Bad form.’
‘Leo! Honestly.’
‘Well, it is. No gentleman would divorce his wife.’ Clearly he meant what he said. She was surprised and amused in equal measure.
‘Anyway, the good news is she’s met someone, who’s rich, much richer than me, and good-looking and all the things that matter to her. So now she wants a divorce and quickly. I shall do the decent thing and provide grounds, you know, weekend in Brighton, and that will be that.’
‘Goodness,’ said Diana. She would have laid every kind of bad behaviour at Leo’s door, but not this rather upright gentlemanly stuff. ‘I didn’t like the lying, Leo. Well, actually I don’t mind lying when there’s a reason for it, but that all seemed so pointless.’
‘Like yours about Ned Welles?’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘My darling Diana, you’re a rather bad liar. Ned Welles is as queer as a nine-bob note – I always thought so and just now you confirmed it.’
Diana stood up. Her eyes were blazing. ‘Get out,’ she said. ‘Just get out. How dare you insult and – and slander – my best friend.’
‘Hey, did I say I disapproved in any way? Did I display any animosity, or prejudice? Of course I didn’t. My little brother is homosexual. I love him most dearly. Together with our mother we conspire to keep it from our father. Who would treat it in the time-honoured way of a daily thrashing.’
‘He’s a landscape designer. He’s currently working on a huge scheme at some pile in Warwickshire. Living in digs in Stratford. We could go up and see him, you’d love him, take in something at the RSC maybe. I’m a huge fan of the Bard. You?’
‘Um – not really,’ said Diana cautiously. Actually, there was nothing she hated more than an evening of the stuff.
‘I shall convert you. I shall make that my Diana mission. I like to have a mission with every woman.’
Diana wasn’t sure about being lumped together with the rest of womankind.
‘Now, you can pour me another G and T, and then we can decide what to do about lunch. And then after lunch. I can think of a few things, but –’
All Diana could think of, and before rather than after lunch, was going to bed with him. She felt quite consumed by the idea, every part of her hungry, greedy, desire working at her like some restless animal, rampaging through her emotions.
‘So,’ he said, reading some of this in her dark eyes as she looked at him, in her shaking hand as she took his glass, in the smile trying to be cool as she handed it back again. ‘So, would you like to go out to lunch or would you rather stay in? And you might as well be truthful, not fuss about being ladylike. Because –’
‘I’d rather stay in,’ she said.