New York, Scotland, London, Eleuthera, 1985–6
PHAEDRIA SPENT MUCH of the flight to New York being sick. She reflected miserably, looking at her ashen, haggard face in the mirror in the plane lavatory, that until she had got mixed up with the Morell family she had never been sick in her life and for the past year she seemed to have been throwing up almost constantly. It did not seem quite the sort of thing normally associated with life with the rich and famous; she wondered, managing a shaky smile at herself, where she had gone wrong.
She also felt bereft without Julia, without her constant, reassuring, demanding company. She didn’t exactly feel worried about her, Nanny Hunter was quite wonderful and they were staying at Marriotts with Mrs Mildred to keep an eye on things as well, and the excellent GP down there had promised to look in every day just to make sure the baby was perfectly well, but she was quite simply missing her horribly: she felt oddly distracted, some piece of her still fixed firmly behind. Well, it was only for four days. Four days: and two of them with Michael. Phaedria felt interestingly nervous at the notion. She felt she was being presented to him, or at least presenting herself, for examination, rather like an interesting species under the microscope. It was the first time they would spend any time together by arrangement, from choice, and it felt oddly awkward, embarrassing even.
On the other hand, it was a glorious prospect. She surveyed the time, uninterrupted, unthreatened, time to talk, to do things, to make discoveries about one another, and smiled with pure pleasure. Then she considered that the time was likely, indeed certain, to involve a great deal of sex, and she felt sick again. It was not the prospect of the sex itself that was provoking the nausea, but sheer fright at the thought of actually, finally, having to go to bed with Michael. She wanted to, she longed for it, had been longing for it for what seemed like ever, but there was something oddly calculating about the circumstances in which it had to happen. ‘Here you are,’ Fate seemed to be saying to them both, firmly, sternly even, ‘together at last. Perform.’ This was, as the saying went, no rehearsal, and she was terribly afraid she was going to fluff her lines.
Her fear was partly, largely even, she knew (and recognizing this knowledge sent her lurching into the lavatory yet again) because Michael had had this long, long affair with Roz. And then Phaedria was not confident about herself and her own sexuality at all; she had only ever been to bed with Julian, and he had been (she supposed) very skilful and talented. But she had always been aware that her own input had been very limited, indeed Julian had tended to discourage anything but a fairly passive role from her in bed (and would have liked the same kind of behaviour elsewhere, she thought with a pang that was half amusement, half regret). And much of the time, she had not felt that she was very responsive to him even: there had been occasions when their lovemaking had been wonderful, exquisite even – the night in the car, the last night before Julian’s heart attack, on their honeymoon after she had recovered from her sunburn – but the very fact she could tick them off on her fingers worried her even; maybe she was frigid. Sex certainly hadn’t been up to now a highly motivating force in her life; she often worried also that since Julian’s death she really had not felt any serious frustration at all. Michael had stirred her senses, made her think about sex a great deal, but then, she felt, to a degree that was the emotional excitement of their relationship rather than her own physical needs. At least, she thought, she had felt something very strong for Miles that day; at least something good had come out of it.
Roz was clearly very sexually motivated, and very sexy, everyone said so, and that just made everything worse, for she would be there, inevitably, a strong, fearsome presence haunting the bed; Phaedria, with yet another pang of terror and misery, wondered just how she was going to handle any of it. Well, there was no escape now. Short of staying on the plane and going back to London, or telling Michael she had changed her mind, she had to go through with it.
She suddenly heard the beep going that meant they were beginning the descent. She washed her face for what seemed like the hundredth time that morning, cleaned her teeth, brushed her hair, and walked as steadily as she could back to her seat, and on to centre stage.
‘You look terrible,’ said Michael, holding her at ami’s length away from him. ‘I cannot believe how terrible you look.’
He had been standing waiting for her by customs; her heart tipped over at the sight of him. She was struck forcibly, not for the first time, at the way he projected sexual power. He had an immense suppressed energy; he moved slowly, but as if he was waiting for something, as if he was about to take off at great speed. He had obviously made a great effort to look impressive for her; he had on a grey coat she had not seen before with a black velvet collar; his hair was neatly brushed, he was very freshly shaved, his tie was straight, his shirt uncrumpled. His dark eyes, exploring hers, exploring her, were tentative, tender; his mouth oddly soft and half smiling. He looked, she thought, almost cheerful.
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘You, on the other hand, look very nice. Did anyone tell you your face looks as if you had slept in it?’
‘No, I don’t think so. But if it’s your phrase I like it. What have you been doing, for God’s sake?’
‘Throwing up,’ said Phaedria slightly sheepishly.
‘Dear God,’ he said, ‘if you are to continue to vomit every time we come close to one another, I’m not sure there is a great deal of future in this relationship. Come on, darling, Franco is outside with the car. Should I get some strong paper bags in for you?’
‘No,’ she said, smiling at him, thinking how, as always, he carried happiness for her in his wake. ‘No, I’m all right now.’
‘Good.’
The mammoth black stretch waited by the kerb; Franco was ignoring, with an earnest insolence, the harassment of a traffic cop. ‘Good heavens,’ said Phaedria, surveying the car’s length, its tinted windows, its waving aerials, ‘you’ve brought the apartment with you.’
‘Yeah, there’s a double bed and a Jacuzzi inside. Get in, darling, or we’ll all be arrested.’
She got in. ‘This is quite a car,’ she said.
‘It gets me about.’
‘I never understand why these things have two aerials.’
‘One’s for the TV. Keeps me awake while I’m driving. Franco, we’ll just go home for now.’
‘Sure thing, Mr Browning.’
They pulled away from the airport; she sat awkwardly, slightly apart from him, on the back seat, silent, looking out of the window. He looked at her, and his lips twitched.
‘Are you going to tell me what’s the matter, or shall I tell you?’
She looked at him startled. ‘Nothing’s the matter.’
‘Of course there is. Otherwise you wouldn’t be sitting over there like a frightened rabbit.’
She smiled sheepishly. ‘Well, I – well, it’s –’
He smiled at her. ‘OK. Let me tell you. You’re scared. Here we are, two people hardly knowing one another, and the Man Upstairs has shacked us up together for two whole days and told us to get on with it. And in among all the other things we have to get on with is a whole load of screwing. And you know I’ve been to bed a great many times with Roz and I know you’ve been to bed a great many times with her father, and neither of us knows quite how we are going to handle it. Well, let me tell you, baby, I’m shit scared too.’
‘Oh, Michael,’ said Phaedria, crawling thankfully across the seat and into his arms, ‘how is it you always make everything absolutely all right?’
They went to bed as soon as they got back to the duplex. Michael said firmly, removing her coat, taking her hand, leading her up the stairs, that it was really the only thing to do, to get it over and done with. ‘We will deflower one another,’ he said, very seriously, ‘and then we can start to enjoy ourselves.’
‘Good God,’ said Phaedria, standing still, looking round the black and white bedroom, its massive circular bed with the battery of switches and lights set into the head, its arced video screen, the mirrored ceiling, the jungle of plants and brilliant tropical flowers all along one wall, the aquarium of dazzling sea fish built in all along another, ‘this is no place for a virgin.’
‘Don’t you like it?’ he said, and he looked so anxious, so near to hurt, so desperate that it should please her, that all her nervousness left her and she sat down on the bed, kicking off her shoes, smiling up at him.
‘I love it,’ she said, ‘and I think I’m going to love you.’
Michael took off his jacket, his tie, his own shoes, threw them on the floor, lay down on the bed, and pulled her up beside him. He took her in his arms and said, ‘Now let’s just quit worrying. Let’s just go with it.’
There was a bad moment: after he had kissed her for so long and with such delicious slowness she felt as if she would scream if she couldn’t have more of him; after he had removed her clothes and his, and lain for a long time, just looking at her; after he had stroked her and smoothed her and played with her pubic hair and kissed and teased and sucked at her nipples; after she had, relieved at her own hunger, climbed on to him, lain there, rising and falling slowly on to him, feeling his penis silky hard against her clitoris, feeling the fire mount, heat, roar; after he had turned her suddenly, looked into her eyes, said her name over and over again; after he had moved down, kissing, teasing, caressing her with his tongue and she had lain, her eyes closed, thrusting herself at him, rhythmically, gently; after she had felt her whole body turned liquid, white hot, and he moved up again and slowly, tenderly sank into her; then, suddenly then, a face swam into her consciousness, a pain-filled, frightened, dying face, and she tensed, tightened, froze. He drew away from her then at once, looked down at her, said, ‘Look at me, Phaedria, don’t think, don’t think, just know that I love you.’
And she opened her eyes again, looked into his, different, eyes, loving, concerned, patient eyes, and the moment was gone and she smiled and threw back her head; arched her body, drew him in, in, all the great longing urgency of him, and he groaned, cried out suddenly and came, clutching at her, and she was left, still suspended, alone, empty, and yet happy, oddly triumphant.
‘Oh, God,’ he said after a moment, and there was a sob in his voice, ‘oh, God, I would have given the world for that not to have happened.’
And no, she said, no don’t mind, don’t, it doesn’t matter, it more than doesn’t matter, it was good, it was the right thing, I needed to wait, please don’t be sad.
‘Very well,’ he said, moving from her, lying on his elbow, looking at her with a wealth of love, ‘you shall wait. But not for long. I promise you not for long.’
‘Now,’ he said, after they had breakfasted off brioches and strawberries and orange juice laced with champagne, and coffee he had made himself with enormous care and exactness on his espresso machine, ‘now I think we should go out. I want to take you for a walk in the park, and then I want to take you for lunch at Le Cirque and then I want to bring you back here and make love to you again, and then I want to take you shopping and then I want to take you to tea at the Plaza and then I want to make love to you again, and then I have tickets for My One and Only, and then I thought we could have supper at Un Deux Trois and then we can come home and make love again, and we can see the New Year in in an absolutely outstanding, shattering, earth-moving, mind-blowing way. How does that grab you, as they used to say? If you trust me to deliver the last,’ he added slightly soberly.
‘I trust you utterly and it grabs me beautifully,’ said Phaedria, leaning forward, kissing him tenderly, ‘the only thing is it’s an awful lot of eating. I shall get fat.’
‘No, you won’t, as long as we keep screwing. Do you know how many calories a good screw uses up?’
‘No, I don’t think I do.’
‘Three hundred. At a modest estimate.’
‘Three hundred calories isn’t really very much food.’
‘Then,’ he said, lifting his hand, stroking her cheek with infinite gentleness, ‘there will have to be still more screwing.’
‘I have a New Year present for you,’ said Michael.
They were sitting in the Un Deux Trois, encased in a warm, bright pleasure that was almost tangible, smiling indulgently and detachedly at the increasingly frenetic revelry around them; Michael has been drawing hearts on the paper tablecloth with the coloured crayons provided by the thoughtful management, and writing ‘I love you’ in ever larger and more florid letters on every spare inch of it.
Phaedria looked at him, and felt a moving and stirring in her heart that she knew as more than tenderness, more than sex, more than love itself; that was a warm, melting, joyous longing to take him to her, to be with him, of him, always and for ever, to become part of him and to have him part of her.
‘I love you,’ she said, and it was the first time she had said it, and there were tears in her eyes, ‘I love everything about you.’
‘Now listen,’ he said, ‘you didn’t get your present yet. It might put you right off.’
‘No,’ she said, very serious, ‘nothing in this world could put me right off you.’
There was a catch in her voice; he looked at her startled, saw the tears, felt his own heart lurch.
‘Hey,’ he said, ‘don’t start crying. You’ll be throwing up on me next.’ But in spite of the lightness in his voice, he was emotionally shaken too; his own eyes felt suddenly burning and moist.
‘This is ridiculous,’ he said, smiling at her slightly shakily, ‘we are supposed to be enjoying ourselves. Do you want me to shred up this cloth to dry your tears?’
‘No,’ she said, laughing suddenly, taking his hand, kissing it, ‘don’t, please don’t. I want to keep this cloth for ever and ever, to remind me of when I was perfectly happy.’
‘I intend to see you stay perfectly happy,’ he said.
‘No, you can’t, even you can’t do that,’ said Phaedria, serious again. ‘You can’t stay up there, for ever, balancing on the tip of the world. You have to come down, take on real life, let other people in.’
‘That’s dumb. That doesn’t mean you can’t be perfectly happy. I love other people. I’m happy to share you with them.’
‘Oh, all right, we’ll stay perfectly happy. But just now I am extra perfectly happy. How’s that?’
‘That’s OK. Now can I give you your present? Maybe I should get a spare tablecloth or something just in case it makes you cry again.’
‘You can, and I won’t need a tablecloth. Please give it to me.’
‘All right. But now I come to think about it, maybe we should have some more champagne first.’
‘Goodness. It must be quite a present.’
‘It has, I hope,’ he said, with his oddly gloomy smile, ‘a certain style to it.’
He ordered another bottle of Bollinger; poured some out, raised his glass to her. ‘Happy New Year, honeybunch.’
‘Happy New Year, Michael.’
‘OK. Here we go.’
He opened the briefcase he had under the table, pulled out a large envelope, handed it to her. She looked at him, smiled doubtfully, opened it slowly. A big glossy folder was inside it.
‘Michael, what is this?’
‘Look at it. You can read, for Christ’s sake.’
She looked. ‘Lederer and Lederer’ it said in embossed letters on the cover ‘Real Estate Agents. Madison Avenue, New York’.
‘Michael,’ said Phaedria, looking at him, ‘Michael, what on earth have you been doing?’
‘Buying you something to play with. Go on, look inside.’
She opened the folder slowly. A photograph fell out. A low, white house, two storeys high, with a veranda running its length. Another photograph: paddocks, with horses; another: a stableyard.
‘Michael, what is this? Where is this? No, I can’t read, I forgot to tell you.’
‘It’s a house. You will have heard of houses, I imagine. This particular example is for you. It’s in Connecticut. Horsy country, or so I’m told. The horses are an optional extra.’
‘And you’ve actually bought this for me?’
‘Well, I didn’t have anyone else in mind.’
‘Michael, this is just amazing. I just don’t know what to say.’
‘You could say you like it.’
‘I like it. I love it. I adore it. But why did you do it?’
‘That’s a pretty dumb question, I’d say. I bought it for you because I love you. Because I thought you’d be pleased. Because I know you like horses. I think they’re pretty scary myself, but maybe you can convert me. Because I reckoned if I was to keep you happy over here you’d need a few of them around. I don’t have too much room for stables in the apartment. Because – oh, well, I suppose because I could just see you there. Because I wanted you to have it. And I thought maybe you might invite me down occasionally as your house guest.’
‘I might. Are you really scared of horses?’
‘Shit scared.’
‘I didn’t think you were scared of anything.’
‘Honey, you just got yourself laid by the biggest coward in the US of A.’
‘It’s true.’
‘What else are you scared of?’
‘Oh, all kinds of things. Spiders.’
‘Spiders!’
‘Yup. The dentist. Getting sick. Right now I have a new one.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Losing you.’
‘Oh,’ said Phaedria, looking at him, a whole loving heart in her dark eyes, ‘you don’t have to be scared of that. Not in the very least.’
‘I’ll try to believe you.’
‘Oh, God,’ she said, returning to the brochure, thumbing through the particulars, gazing at the pictures, ‘this is just so beautiful. I love it, I love it. But, oh, Michael, this is too much of a present. It’s spoiling me.’
‘I am planning on spoiling you,’ he said, ‘a lot. Every day for the rest of our lives, if I can manage it.’
‘Well, you’ve certainly made a good start. It is just the most lovely place, and the most wonderful thing is it’s so exactly what I would have chosen myself. It’s quite quite different from Marriotts and yet it has the same kind of feel. I don’t know how to thank you.’
‘I’ll think of a way. When did Julian buy Marriotts?’
‘Oh, years and years ago. When he was married to Eliza.’
‘And how many gee-gees do you have there?’
‘About a dozen altogether. Two of my own. One, my own special favourite, she’s called Grettisaga, is in foal.’
‘She is? When’s it due?’
‘Oh, in the spring.’
‘Does she have to go to hospital to have it?’
‘No, I thought a home birth would be better.’
‘And why do you love this pregnant lady so much?’
‘I’m not sure. She’s beautiful. She’s powerful. She’s seen me safely through a few scrapes. I just love her.’
‘Well, maybe you can find me a very very ploddy old creature and try and convert me.’
‘I’ll try.’
‘I tried to learn once before. Carol thought I might make a good accessory for her behind the hounds. It was terrible. I just fell off over and over again. In the end, I decided I was over twenty-one and I didn’t have to carry on with it. She was terribly cross. I liked the clothes, though,’ he added, brightening up. ‘I thought they were terrific.’
‘There’s a tailor’s in London,’ she said, ‘called Hunstman’s, where they have a wooden horse to sit on, so you can make sure your breeches fit properly.’
‘Really? Would you take me? Maybe I could buy their horse, and not worry about having to get along with a real one.’
‘I don’t think they’d sell it to you.’
‘Oh, nonsense. Everything has its price.’
‘Even you?’
‘Even me.’
‘And what exactly is your price, Mr Browning?’
‘To you, Lady Morell, a special knockdown offer. A big double bed and you sprawled across it with absolutely nothing on at all, and I’m yours for life on easy terms.’
‘All right,’ she said, standing up, holding out her hand. ‘Come on, let’s go. I want to take possession right away.’
‘Please let me come to the Bahamas with you,’ he said.
‘You can’t,’ she said, ‘I don’t think my body would survive it.’
‘I could leave your body alone.’
‘You wouldn’t.’
‘You’re right, I wouldn’t.’
They were lying in bed on the afternoon of New Year’s Day; they had been skating in the Rockefeller Centre and lunched off the street stalls on pretzels and knish, and cans of root beer; they had planned to go on down to Chinatown, but Michael had suddenly looked at Phaedria as she sat in the cold sunshine, the light spangling her wild hair, biting hungrily into her food, and had felt a wave of longing for her so strong it caught his breath. He had reached out and touched her face and without a word she had stood up and taken his hand and they had walked swiftly, urgently all the way up to Fifth Avenue, up to the apartment block, into the lift, up into the duplex, the bedroom, and then facing one another, still not speaking, their eyes fixed on one another, they had torn off their clothes and fallen, hungrily, greedily on to one another and the bed.
Later he had got up, she had been half asleep, and made some hot chocolate and brought it to her and had sat beside her, feeding her morsels of crumbled chocolate flake bar, occasionally bending to kiss her breasts.
‘I like them better small,’ he said. ‘They were nice big, and I look forward to seeing them big again when we have our children, but right now I like them small.’
‘How many children are we going to have?’ she asked.
‘Oh, not too many. Around a dozen.’
‘Six of each?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘twelve the same, all girls. Just like their mother.’
‘I love you,’ she said.
‘I love you too,’ he said. ‘Now you see, I was right, wasn’t I?’
‘What about?’
‘About us.’
‘Yes, I think you were. Was –’ she hesitated – ‘is – well, is the sex all right?’
‘No,’ he said, smiling at her, into her eyes, ‘no, it isn’t all right. It’s lovely. Beautiful. You’re very special.’
‘Really?’
‘Really. Don’t look so worried. What a naïve question.’
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I know, but I am naïve, sexually. I do worry about it. I’ve only had – well, one lover really. Often I didn’t even want him.’
‘Really?’ he said, and his eyes lit up. ‘That is just amazing. Tell me about it.’
‘Oh God,’ she said, ‘you’ve got your interested face on.’
‘I am interested. Really. Come on, tell me about it.’
‘Michael, I can’t. It feels like a betrayal.’
‘You can. It’s not a betrayal. You’ve been terribly loyal to him. This is important. It’s about you. About us. Now come on. Tell me about it.’
She told him. Not everything, but a lot. About her fears that she was sexually cold; about how she had learnt to pretend for Julian; about how she had never really wanted to go to bed with anyone else, before or since. ‘Except you,’ she added truthfully.
‘And how was it for you, Lady Morell? With me, I mean.’
‘It was lovely,’ she said truthfully. ‘But then – well, it’s only just begun. I may start having to pretend for you. I’m sure Roz never –’ her voice trailed off.
Michael looked at her, his face softening with tenderness. ‘Yesterday morning must have been real bad for you.’
‘No, it wasn’t. Really. And the afternoon was lovely.’
‘I hope so. I really do. Did you ever wonder if it was us guys making your sex life a misery, rather than yourself? No, I guess you wouldn’t. OK, let’s talk about Roz. Roz is one sexy lady. She’s a great lay. No, don’t look like that, we need to talk her out of our bed. Screwing you is different. Gentler. Softer. Less greedy. I have loved it. I think I always shall love it. And I want you to promise me that if you ever don’t love it, you will tell me instead of getting that tortured psyche of yours into a terrible tangle. All right?’
‘All right. I love you very much.’
‘I love you too. And I don’t think you’re seriously frigid. Not seriously.’
She smiled at him.
‘And when are you going to marry me?’
‘Oh, Michael, I don’t know,’ she said, suddenly anxious. ‘We have so much to resolve before I can think about that.’
‘What do we have to resolve?’ he said, his voice light, but his face wary, watchful.
‘You know what. The company. Miles. Roz. Everything.’
‘Roz and Miles I can see. The company I can’t. You can just leave it. Come and live here with me. Forget all about it.’
‘Michael, I can’t do that. I really can’t.’
‘Why not, for Christ’s sake?’ he said and there was real anger in his voice. ‘Jesus, I spent years waiting to get Roz away from that thing. I don’t intend to spend years more waiting for you. Just give it all up.’
‘No,’ she said, and her dark eyes were steady, in spite of a gripping fear. ‘No, I can’t.’
‘Why the hell not?’
‘Because Julian left it to me. Because I care about it. But most of all for Julia.’
‘Julia? What’s she got to do with it?’
‘A lot.’
‘How?’
‘Michael, she’s Julian’s child. He didn’t know about her, but if he had he would have wanted her to have it. All of it possibly. Certainly a lot. He probably wouldn’t have played this bloody silly game with Miles and Roz and me at all.’
‘I think he would. I think he would have had even more fun. Tangling you all up, having you tripping over one another. God, I thought I’d finally got rid of the guy, and he’s still coming at me from the grave.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘If you’re sorry, Phaedria, prove it. Say you’ll give it up. Come to New York. Marry me.’
‘No, I can’t.’
‘Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I thought a few minutes ago, you said you loved me.’
‘I did. I do love you. I know I do.’
‘Pardon me, but I think you don’t.’
She sat and looked at him, amazed at her calm in the face of the terrifying, sudden storm.
‘I do love you, Michael, but I can’t do what you want. I can’t give up the company. Not yet. Maybe later when it’s settled, when I have a trust fund organized for Julia, when Miles has made up his mind, when the thing is running on a proper constructive basis, when Roz and I have a modus operandi, when . . .’
‘Oh, no,’ he said. ‘No. I’m sorry, Phaedria, but I will not play junior lead to that company. I will not.’
‘I don’t understand you,’ she said.
‘You don’t understand? Dear God, how am I supposed to? Just what do you want me to do? Give everything up this end, move over there, sit around waiting for you to come home every night?’
‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘Just wait. Just try to see.’
‘I’m sorry, but I can’t deliver. I’m tired of waiting. And I don’t see. How you can let that tangle of power and intrigue get to you, and keep you away from your own happiness.’
‘But if you’d only . . .’
‘Maybe I do see,’ he said, and there was a great heavy sadness in his voice. ‘I see that in your own way you are as greedy as Roz. And as selfish. I see that like her, you want it all your way. My love, your way. Well you can have my love Phaedria, but only my way.’
‘Which means?’
‘You know what it means. You have to give it up.’
‘I can’t. I told you.’
‘Well then,’ he said.
‘Then – what?’
‘Then you may as well go. Go back to it. Now.’
‘Very well.’
She got up silently; walked to the shower, dressed, packed her things. Put on her coat, stood facing him. He was still naked on the bed, stricken, but yet angry.
‘Shall I have Franco take you to the airport?’
‘Yes, please. It would be helpful.’
‘I hope,’ he said, with a huge sigh, pulling on his towelling robe, walking over to the house telephone, buzzing Franco, ‘I hope you know what you are doing.’
‘I’m afraid I do,’ she said. ‘I am very very sad, but I’m afraid I do.’
She had thought at first, as she sat, frozen with shock and disbelief in the car, amazed that happiness and love could turn so swiftly to pain and distancing, that she would go straight home, but she decided to go to Eleuthera after all. She needed time on her own, peace, a base to reflect from. And she felt instinctively that that house, that place, where she had been only once, and then much in love with Julian, was the natural one to be.
It was a totally fateful decision.
Julia first became ill around lunch time on New Year’s Day. She had had a cough ever since the beginning of Christmas, but suddenly it got worse. Her temperature began to climb, she was restless, fretful. Nanny Hunter, initially calm, began to worry. At tea time she sent for the GP. He came at once, looked Julia over, listened to her small chest and then put his stethoscope away, looking mildly worried.
‘I really don’t think there’s much to worry about. She has a slight chest infection, I wouldn’t take any notice at all, if it weren’t for her history. I’ll leave you some antibiotic to give her, call me if she gets any worse.’
Nanny Hudson, comforted, gave Julia the antibiotic, persuaded her to take her bottle and put her to bed. She seemed calmer and went to sleep.
Two hours later, she woke up crying. She was extremely hot, coughing violently; Nanny Hudson phoned the GP. He came back, examined the baby carefully again, and then said, ‘I wouldn’t do this if her mother was here, but I think perhaps she should go to hospital. Just to be on the safe side. There’s an excellent one in Eastbourne, you can be there in half an hour. I presume someone can drive you. I’m sure she’ll be fine tomorrow, but it will be a better place for her, and you, to spend the night.’
‘All right, Doctor Spender,’ said Nanny Hudson, trying to fight down the fear that was rising in her. ‘If that’s what you think, I would feel happier too. Should I get Lady Morell home?’
‘Where is she?’
‘In New York.’
‘Hmm. I suppose you should tell her. She could get home very quickly if she wanted to. Which I expect she would. Yes, give her a call.’
Nanny Hudson, her hands trembling, dialled the number Phaedria had given her in New York. There was no reply. She packed a bag for Julia and herself and tried again. Still no reply. Pete was waiting with the car. She decided to try again from the hospital.
Miles, Roz, Eliza and Peveril were still celebrating New Year.
Peveril had insisted on giving a party for Hogmanay in Miles’ honour, and most of the county had come to the castle for champagne and Scottish reels, (interspersed with the occasional Charleston from Letitia) and to see the New Year piped in. Miles had found the whole thing, but particularly the reels, totally enchanting, and joined in with immense enthusiasm, insisting on borrowing a kilt from Peveril, which being rather too large for him, had fallen down in the middle of an Eightsome Reel. This had greatly added to the enjoyment of the women guests, particularly as he had insisted on adhering strictly to Scottish male dress and not worn any underpants.
On the evening of New Year’s Day they had gone to dinner with Peveril’s sister and her husband thirty miles away, on the other side of Sidlaw Hills. Letitia, reluctant to miss out on any fun, and still more reluctant to admit she was feeling her age, had still been forced to admit that a quiet evening on her own might be an attractive idea.
She had just settled down with her feet up and switched her television on when she heard the telephone; Monro, the butler, knocked on her door and said could she come, there was an urgent call for her.
It was Nanny Hudson, now at the hospital in Eastbourne; Julia’s temperature was still rising, she seemed to be in considerable pain, and they were considering putting her in an oxygen tent. There was no reply to the number in New York Lady Morell had given her, did Mrs Morell have any idea where else she might be contactable?
‘Oh, God,’ said Letitia. ‘Poor Phaedria. Poor child. If anything happens to that baby, I think she will kill herself. No, Nanny. I’m sorry, I don’t. I thought she was in Eleuthera anyway.’
‘She will be tomorrow, madam, but not today. She should still be in New York, she specifically said that there would always be someone there to take messages, even if she was out for a while herself.’
‘Oh, Nanny, this is awful. How bad is the baby?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Nanny Hudson, and Letitia could hear the struggle to keep panic from invading her voice. ‘Quite bad. Her temperature is a hundred and four. I feel very very worried.’
‘Is there a good doctor there? Oh, if only you were in London. If only I was in London.’
‘I think the staff here is excellent. The consultant paediatrician is on his way. But I think – well, I’m sure actually – I’m afraid – she may be developing pneumonia.’
‘Dear God. Nanny, stay there, keep calm. Oh, what nonsense I’m talking, you are far calmer than I. I will phone the house on Eleuthera, it’s easier for me, and leave a message to meet Lady Morell at Nassau, in case she’s on her way there now, and stop her travelling on to Eleuthera. That will save hours of time tomorrow at least. Oh, God, and she could have been home in just a few hours from New York. This is terrible. Well, maybe she will come back tonight, still. I’ll keep trying the number for you, if you like, and then you won’t have to leave the baby. Nanny, let me know if there’s any change, won’t you? This is terrible.’
She put the phone down and called the house at Turtle Cove. It was quite early in the day there. Jacintha, the housekeeper, said no, Lady Morell was not expected until the next day at lunch time.
‘Well, Jacintha, you must get Nelson to go to Nassau. Immediately. Wait for Lady Morell there. Tell her to go back to England. I will have a message left for her at the airport, of course, but to be on the safe side, I think Nelson should go as well.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Jacintha was sulky. She had been looking forward to a good New Year holiday with Nelson, they had planned a boat trip, and a bottle of champagne from Sir Julian’s cellar. They thought of the house as more and more their own, now that visitors came so rarely and the master had gone. Still, a baby was a precious thing, and if Lady Morell’s baby was ill, then she must be sent home at once. Although what she had been doing away without the baby, Jacintha could not imagine. They were strange folks, the rich English.
Phaedria caught a flight to Nassau quite quickly. She could see it was going to mean spending the night there, that there would be no connecting flight until next day, but she felt a compulsion to get away from New York. Strange how the city was haunted by unhappiness for her.
She began to come to on the plane, her emotions thawing into painful life. Michael’s words kept coming back to her: ‘You are as selfish as Roz . . . as greedy as Roz . . . Go, go now . . . I will not play junior lead to that company.’
Oh, God, what had she done? Why had she done it? Was it really greed, selfishiness? No, no she knew it wasn’t. She had acted from a strong, almost primeval urge to protect her territory and her family. Julian had bequeathed her the birthright of the company and it was Julia’s birthright and she had to safeguard it for her. That was all there was to it. And if she had to lose all that was personally dear to her to do it, then she would have to endure that. It seemed cruel, horribly cruel that she should have to lose Michael and happiness when she had only just discovered both, but she honestly felt there was little option.
Thinking about Michael, what he had become to her in thirty-six short hours, pain almost overcame her, made her physically faint. He had brought her joy, laughter, tenderness, love; he had made her feel safe, peaceful, cared for, at ease. She could see, with a vivid clarity, all that her life could have become, all that she had deprived it of; and yet she had had, she knew, no choice at all. She had made a decision, although she had not known it, first, when she had married Julian, and then when she had borne his child, that she would become part of him and his life, and that life had included, indeed in large part consisted of, the company. And there could be no going back from it now.
In a hospital, thousands of miles away, her baby for the second time in her short, tender life, fought death, drawing strength from where or what she did not know: but with a spirit that was a legacy from her father, who had lost his own battle finally, and a mother who had a courage of her own, the full extent of which she had only just discovered.
Letitia was still up, pacing the Great Hall, willing the phone to ring, when the others came back from their party, laughing, talking loudly, full of ‘did you see’ and ‘wasn’t she?’ and ‘didn’t he?’
‘Granny Letitia, whatever is it?’ said Roz quickly, taking in her grandmother’s white face, her haunted eyes. ‘It isn’t – it isn’t – ?’
And no, said Letitia, swift to recognize a mother’s permanent, painful anxiety, ‘No, it isn’t Miranda, it’s Julia, she’s very ill, in an oxygen tent with pneumonia and Phaedria is away and can’t be contacted.’
‘Oh, Christ, that baby is doomed,’ said Roz, every hostility and outrage forgotten in a sudden, sweeping concern, ‘and why not, why can’t she be contacted? For heaven’s sake, she must have left a number, why doesn’t somebody ring it?’
‘We have been ringing it,’ said Letitia patiently, ‘but she isn’t there.’
‘Well, where is she then? She’s on Eleuthera, isn’t she? It’s not a big place, surely she can be found.’
‘No,’ said Miles, suddenly, feeling, knowing he had to speak, ‘no, she isn’t on Eleuthera, she’s in New York.’
‘New York?’ said Roz. ‘New York? What on earth is she doing in New York? Why did we all think –’ Her voice trailed away into silence, and she looked first shocked, then angry as she faced Miles. ‘How the hell did you know she was in New York, and why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Be quiet, Rosamund,’ said Letitia angrily. ‘Why shouldn’t Phaedria be in New York, and what does it matter anyway? As a matter of fact, I knew she was there, Nanny Hudson told me, I’ve been ringing the number myself. That baby’s life is in danger. All that matters is that, and that we have to find Phaedria. I’m shocked at you.’
Roz ignored her. ‘What is this number in New York?’
‘It’s over there by the telephone. I was just going to try it again, anyway.’
Roz went over and looked at the piece of paper. But she didn’t really need to. It was a number she felt was engraved on her heart.
The plane landed on Nassau at ten o’clock local time. Phaedria didn’t even bother to check whether there was a flight out to Eleuthera. All she wanted was to go to bed and to find a respite, however brief, from her pain. She had no baggage, only her overnight bag; she walked straight out of the airport and into a cab without ever seeing the message for her pinned to the board in the arrival hall, and she was also not to know that at that very moment, Nelson was desperately trying to find someone to pilot Julian’s plane out of Eleuthera and into Nassau.
While Nanny Hudson sat helpless, terrified, by the oxygen hood, watching Julia wage her battle, Miles sat by Roz’s huge fourposter bed as she wept endlessly, hopelessly, into her pillow.
‘Roz, you just have to know two things. One is that I only found out by the oddest chance. Two is that Phaedria didn’t want you to know. I know she didn’t, she wanted to spare you.’
‘Jesus Christ!’ Roz’s face, ugly, swollen with crying and rage, lifted from her pillow. ‘Why does everyone have to regard that bitch as some kind of a saint? If she’d wanted to spare me she could have left him alone in the first place. Just why don’t you fuck off, Miles, and leave me alone?’
‘Because it wouldn’t do any good. Because you need company. Because I care about you.’
‘If you’d cared about me, you wouldn’t have lied to me.’
‘Roz, I didn’t lie to you. I simply didn’t tell you Phaedria was going to New York.’
‘And how did you find out that she was going to New York? Some kind of psychic transmission, is that what you’re trying to imply?’
‘No, I’m not trying to imply anything. I’m telling you. I was talking to Phaedria, and she let it slip that she was going to New York. I promised her I wouldn’t tell you. I feel bad now that I did.’
‘I’m sure you do. Whoever else gets hurt or let down, it mustn’t be Phaedria. Oh, God, I hate her so much.’
Roz’s voice rose in a wail of rage and pain; she was drumming her feet on the bed. Miles looked at her concernedly.
‘Roz, please don’t.’
‘Why not?’ She sat up suddenly and looked at him. ‘This is what you’re always telling me I should do. Let it all out. Let go. What’s wrong with it, all of a sudden?’
‘I don’t know. I guess when her baby is so ill, it seems wrong to hate her so much.’
‘I was very very sorry about her baby,’ said Roz. ‘When we first came in tonight, before I knew where she was, I was desperately sorry, I wanted to help, to find her.’
‘I know,’ said Miles. ‘I saw you were. I know.’
‘But then I found out she was with Michael and I just couldn’t feel anything but hate. I’m sorry. I’m obviously a bad person.’
‘No,’ he said, ‘just an unhappy one.’
‘Oh, shit,’ said Roz, ‘everything is so awful. Everything. I just can’t cope with it all any more.’
‘Of course you can,’ he said, ‘you’re a fighter. You’ll always cope.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘I know so. I’ve told you before. I think you’re terrific.’
She looked at him, and smiled a watery smile. ‘You don’t know me,’ she said.
‘Oh, yes, I do. I think I know you better than most people, as a matter of fact. That’s better, you’re cooling off. Turn around and I’ll massage your neck.’
‘Oh, Miles, no. Not now.’
‘Yeah, now. You need it now.’
She looked at him, a long, considering look.
‘All right.’
‘You’ll have to take that vest thing off.’
‘This vest thing is a silk T-shirt from Joseph.’
‘Who is this Joseph guy and what’s he doing giving you T-shirts?’
Roz giggled.
‘OK, I’ll take it off. Just hang on a minute, I don’t have anything on underneath. Let me get my robe.’
‘OK.’
She went into the bathroom, came back wearing a silk kimono, and sat down on her bed with her back to Miles. He started working on her neck, stroking it, kneading it, pushing the tension out; Roz felt herself relax.
‘That’s so nice.’
‘Good. Now your shoulders.’
He slipped his hands under the gown, began working along the line of her shoulders, down her spine; Roz felt the almost familiar, dangerous lick of warmth through her body. She closed her eyes, put her head back, tried not to think. Miles moved over her shoulders, smoothing the skin down above her breasts, then returned to her spine and gently, insidiously round the sides of her body.
‘Miles,’ she said, half happy, half protesting. ‘You never did that before.’
‘You never were so upset before,’ he said calmly.
‘Maybe not.’
There was a silence while he worked on, his warm strong hands stroking her into an odd sensation: half excitement, half peace.
‘Better?’
‘Much.’
He stopped suddenly, turned her round, looked at her very directly, his dark blue eyes smiling into her green ones.
‘What would really help you,’ he said, almost conversationally, ‘is a good fuck.’
Roz looked at him, shocked, amused and most of all intensely aroused, emotionally and physically.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ she said with an effort.
‘I’m not being ridiculous. It would.’
‘And I suppose,’ she said, in a hopeless attempt to defuse the situation and her emotions, ‘you think you should be the person to administer it.’
‘I certainly do,’ he said and he smiled at her suddenly, his most dangerous, self-mocking, beguiling smile. ‘I certainly do. What’s more I should really like it. Wouldn’t you?’
‘No,’ she said, ‘no, not at all.’
‘You’re lying,’ he said calmly, smiling again.
‘Even if I am, you shouldn’t even consider it. This is not the time or the place, and anyway, there’s Candy.’
‘It is absolutely the time and the place, this is a bedroom, you have a fine bed, and Candy is thousands of miles away.’
Roz looked at him thoughtfully, too amused to be anything but direct. ‘You really think it doesn’t matter, don’t you? To her, I mean.’
‘I really do. It doesn’t.’
‘That is an extremely singular opinion.’
‘Maybe, but it’s mine. That’s what counts.’
‘Well anyway, it would matter to me.’
‘Oh, Roz, but it’s not going to have to matter to you. Anyway, I’m certainly not going to force myself on you. Although I think maybe I’d better go to bed. I want you pretty badly right now, and it’s fairly frustrating just sitting here, looking at you in that thing, with your tits half out. Good night, Roz.’
He bent down and kissed her; just lightly, gently, as he had in the woods; but all the emotion of the evening, the anxiety, the rage, the grief, the tension, swept through Roz and polarized into a frantic hunger. She lay back on the bed, her thin arms round his neck, her lips, her tongue working frantically on his. He kissed her back, hard, briefly, then disentangled himself from her and sat back on the bed looking at her.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘Did you change your mind?’
‘Yes,’ said Roz, very low.
Miles stood up. He pulled off his black tie, his dress shirt. His long body was still very brown, hard, lean. Roz lay there, looking at it, in silence; then she sat up on the bed and slipped off the robe, her eyes fixed on his.
Miles put out his hand, cupped one of her breasts, massaging the nipple gently with his thumb; then he bent and began to lick it, suck it. Roz moaned, took his head in her hands, pressing it to her; then she lay back again, and sighed, a huge long shuddering sigh, smiling up at him.
‘Take those trousers off, for God’s sake,’ she said. ‘I’ve been thinking about this ever since I first set eyes on you, you beautiful bastard.’
The paediatrician looked down at Julia in the oxygen hood; she was still fighting for breath, her small chest heaving with the effort. The sun was streaming in at the windows; it was nearly seven o’clock.
‘I think,’ he said, ‘we have to move her to intensive care.’
Nanny Hudson looked up at him exhausted, so frightened now she could hardly think.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘yes, of course. Is she – is she worse?’
‘Well,’ he said, and sighed, ‘she is certainly no better. Do you want to come down with her?’
‘Yes, please. If I may. Oh, why did this have to happen when her mother was away?’
‘It often does,’ he said, ‘I’m not sure why. They need their mothers, babies do. I’ve just spoken to her grandmother again. She’s still trying to contact the mother. She seems to have totally disappeared.’
Phaedria, who had spent a wretched night at the Colonial Hotel in Nassau, finally got back to the airport at ten in the morning and checked into a flight to Eleuthera.
It was leaving in minutes; she shot through the villagey, comparative informality of Nassau’s passport control and ran out on to the tarmac towards the small yellow plane.
The pilot, a dazzling-looking black girl, was waiting by the steps; she smiled at Phaedria. ‘Look like you just made it, honey. Hurry up now.’
As the plane taxied down the runway the clerk in passport control was receiving a serious dressing down from his superior, who had been alerted (a little late) that a Lady Morell had just checked on to the Eleuthera flight.
‘It was real urgent that we contact that lady, and what do you do? Let her by without a murmur. Now she’s in the sky. Man, will we be in trouble.’
‘It’s these new computer machines,’ said the clerk easily, ‘they just cause a heap of trouble.’
By the time the airport manager had worked out how acutely illogical this remark was, he had no energy left to be annoyed.
Miles woke up in Roz’s bed, wondering briefly where he was. He lay quietly, looking up at the curtains above his head, at the outline of the hills outside the window and then at Roz, her face peaceful, gentle in sleep, oddly unfamiliar.
He smiled to himself, thinking about her; she was a most complex creature. So angry, so tough, but with such a capacity to feel. And extraordinarily sensuous. Miles had spent a great many nights (and days) with a great many women, and he had never quite encountered such passion, such capacity for sexual pleasure as he had found in Roz.
He had expected her to be hungry, ardent, had expected her to greet him, meet him as an equal; what he had not been prepared for was the way she entirely took the initiative, made love to him, used him, as if he were some object, fashioned entirely for her delight.
She came, they both did, almost at once the first time, Roz lying beneath him, gasping, moaning, her long legs wrapped round him, her arms flung out, thrusting her body against him, round him, and he felt her as she climaxed, in seemingly endless violent spasms. He drew back from her then, smiling into her eyes, kissing her tenderly, saying nothing, feeling the sweetness, the triumph of shared release, but Roz did not relax, she was violent, almost angry in her continuing need of him. She turned, and lay on top of him, and began to kiss him, slowly, intensely, and then moved down, licking, sucking, kissing his body, until she reached his penis. She took it in her mouth, working on it, determinedly, hungrily insistent, and then when he was ready for her, and tried to turn her, to enter her again, she said no, no, and it was almost a shout, a cry of triumph and she sat up, astride him, pulling him into her, drawing out her own climax, not allowing him his, retreating from him again and again, until finally he gave himself up to it, and came, and she with him, but not once, several times, and he could feel each time, the waves stronger, more violent, greedier. And still she wasn’t satisfied, still she wanted more.
‘You really are,’ he said, turning from her finally, desperate for rest, for sleep, ‘something else.’
And now, he thought, now what? He was uneasily aware that what he felt for Roz, what he had shared with her through that wild night, was something unique in his experience. It went deeper, felt stronger, sweeter than anything he had ever known. He shifted in the bed, trying to remember how he had felt when he had first slept with the other women he had really cared about, with Candy, with Joanna, and he knew perfectly well it had not been anything like this. Not sexually, nor (more alarmingly) emotionally. He felt, with Roz, a great closeness, a desire to care for her; a tenderness, he supposed it was, trying to analyse it. He felt tenderness towards Candy, too, but it was different, it was lighthearted, it felt less important. He also, in some strange way, felt very responsible for and to Roz. She had few people who liked her and far fewer to love her. Trying rather alarmedly to decide which of the two emotions he felt, he decided it was neither one nor the other, but a strange heady amalgam of the two.
He decided it was just as well Candy was coming back to England soon. This situation could very easily get out of hand.
Phaedria reached Turtle Cove at two o’clock local time. She was exhausted. She had phoned the house repeatedly and got no reply and had had to get one of the appalling local taxis from the airport for the twenty-mile drive to the house. The one she took had its radiator needle jammed permanently on boiling, and a door hanging half off its hinges. The driver talked incessantly about his acute surprise that another year had come and gone. Phaedria tried to be courteous, but her head ached and she felt sick.
When she finally reached the house and walked into the cool hall with its whirring fans, it was deserted. She went down to the kitchen; there was a meal on the table, left abandoned, Marie Celeste-like, on the table, a window hanging open. It seemed strange. Maybe they had got the days mixed up and were expecting her tomorrow. It didn’t matter. She went through to the bedroom and pulled off her hot winter clothes. She climbed into one of the swimsuits she had there, looking at the bed where she and Julian had celebrated their wedding, where she had lain sick with the sun, and he had read to her. It had been a marvellous marriage, especially in the beginning. Whatever he had inflicted on her since, she had loved him very much.
Maybe that had been half the problem with Michael. That she had still been grieving, had not been ready. Part of her, part of her heart was still with Julian. Well, it didn’t matter now.
She sighed and walked out on to the veranda where they had eaten breakfast that first marvellous morning, after the snorkelling. She went down on to the beach and slithered into the warm, silky sea. There was a conch shell by her foot; she ducked under the water and picked it up. It was small, its pink interior pale and marbled. She waded back to the beach and laid it on the silver-white sand.
What a lovely lovely place this was. It made her feel peaceful, in spite of her unhappiness, whole again. She would not sell this of all the houses, if she had to buy Miles out. She would rather sell Hanover Terrace. She needed Turtle Cove.
Thinking about houses made her thoughts turn to the house in Connecticut that Michael had bought her. In her wildest dreams about him, she had not imagined such generosity, such concern for her happiness. She heard his rich rough voice saying, ‘I bought it because I love you,’ and she felt as if some giant hand was squeezing her heart. How, in the name of God, or anything else, was she to survive this new, wrenching misery?
She swam strongly out to sea for a few minutes, then turned and trod water, looking at the shore. Suddenly she saw Jacintha waving at her frantically; puzzled, worried, she swam back in.
‘Whatever is it, Jacintha? What’s the matter?’
‘It’s your baby, Lady Morell.’ She gave the stress on the first syllable, like Laurel. ‘She’s very very ill.’ She sounded excited, important to be bringing such news. Phaedria nearly shook her.
‘What is it? Where is she? Why didn’t someone tell me?’
‘We tried to tell you, Lady Morell, we couldn’t find you. Nelson, he’s in Nassau looking for you. You better phone old Mrs Morell, she tell you all about it. They been phoning you in New York and here all night.’
‘Oh, my God,’ said Phaedria, ‘it must be really serious if they’ve been looking for me that hard. Jacintha, what is the matter with her, what is it, do you know?’
‘I don’t know, ma’am,’ said Jacintha, half enjoying the drama and her momentarily important role in it. ‘All I know your baby real sick. Like I said, you better phone old Mrs Morell.’
‘Yes, all right, Jacintha. Where is Mrs Morell?’
‘She’s in Scotland, Lady Morell. She’s been phoning and phoning you. I have the number right here,’ she added, ‘and the telephone is by your bed.’
‘Yes, Jacintha, thank you, I know where the phone is.’
Phaedria raced over the sand, across the lawn, into the house, frantically dialled the number in Scotland. Letitia answered the phone.
‘Letitia, it’s Phaedria, what’s happening, please tell me, what’s the matter with Julia? Who’s with her, where is she, what can I do?’
‘Oh, Phaedria, thank God we found you. Julia’s in hospital. In Eastbourne. Nanny Hudson is with her. Eliza has flown down to be with them both, we thought someone should go.’
‘But what – what is it? Is it very serious?’
‘Well, darling, it’s silly to tell you it’s not. It’s quite serious. She’s got pneumonia. But she’s – holding her own. And of course pneumonia isn’t what it was. It still sounds very frightening, but with antibiotics it just isn’t so bad. Phaedria? Phaedria, are you still there?’
‘Yes,’ said Phaedria, in a small, quiet voice. ‘I’m still here. Letitia, I don’t know what to do, I won’t be able to get home today. There aren’t many flights out. I suppose I could get the company jet, Geoff is in New York.’
‘Thank God for that,’ said Letitia briskly. ‘He can be with you in a very few hours. You can get him to come and collect you.’
‘Yes, all right.’ Phaedria sounded listless.
‘Darling, don’t despair. I’m sure, quite sure, Julia will be all right. Listen, why don’t you talk to the doctor at the hospital, he’ll be able to reassure you.’
‘Yes, I will. Yes, give me his number. And do you think you could call Geoff, Letitia, get him to ring me here? He’s at the Intercontinental, New York. Thank God he’s not in London. I just feel so –’ her voice trailed shakily away.
‘Yes, of course I will. Now you ring the doctor at Eastbourne, and see what he says. I’ll ring you back in about a quarter of an hour. All right?’
‘All right, Letitia.’
Phaedria put down the phone and frantically, desperately, dialled the number. She got through to Reception, asked for the paediatrician.
‘I’m sorry, that number is busy at the moment. Will you hold?’
‘No,’ she said, almost shouting down the phone. ‘No, I won’t hold, I’m calling from the Bahamas. Will you put me through at once. It’s very very urgent. This is Lady Morell.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said the voice, coldly distasteful. ‘The line is busy. I can’t interrupt. Will you hold, or will you call back?’
‘Oh, God,’ said Phaedria. ‘Oh, God, I’ll hold. No, wait, put me through to intensive care.’
‘I’m afraid I can’t do that,’ said the voice, colder than ever.
‘Why not?’
‘There is no line through to intensive care.’
‘But my baby is in there. Do you have any news of her, can you at least tell me how she is?’
‘Just a moment.’ The voice sounded just slightly more helpful. Phaedria waited, her head drumming with fear, her stomach a clenched knot. There was a long silence.
‘Hallo?’ It was a man’s voice.
‘Hallo, yes. Is that the paediatrician? I’m sorry, I don’t have your name, this is Phaedria Morell.’
‘Lady Morell, yes. This is Peter Dugdale here. Now about your baby . . .’
‘Yes? Yes, how is she?’
‘Not very well, I’m afraid. Not very well at all. She hasn’t got any worse since early this morning, so we have some grounds for optimism, but I don’t feel I can say more than that, at the moment.’
‘But what is it? How did it happen?’
‘She has pneumonia, Lady Morell. She does have a tendency towards respiratory infections, of course, with her history, and I understand she had a cold over Christmas.’
‘Yes, but only a very slight one. And she seemed quite better. Otherwise I wouldn’t have left her. Obviously.’
Guilt was heaping on to her panic; she felt violently sick.
‘Of course not. But even a slight cold could have triggered it off. Perhaps with her history she should have antibiotic cover with any kind of infection of that kind.’
‘So what shall I do? Is there anything, anything at all, I can do, anyone I can get hold of, our own paediatrician, just tell me what to do.’
‘I do assure you she is in the best hands here, the best care. Her – nanny –’ he lingered over the word, giving it a slightly derogatory connotation – ‘has not left her for a moment. You’re very lucky there. And your friend, or is she a relative, Mrs Garrylaig –’
‘Lady Garrylaig,’ said Phaedria absentmindedly.
‘I do beg your pardon.’ The voice was more disdainful still. ‘Well, she is on her way, I believe.’
‘So – just how serious is it? I mean, could she – might she –’
The words would not come; tears streamed down her face.
‘It’s quite serious, Lady Morell. It would be wrong of me to pretend otherwise. But she is holding her own. I can’t say more than that. Try not to worry,’ he added, in the voice of the dutifully sensitive. Phaedria bit her fist; she knew she mustn’t scream, mustn’t get too angry with him, antagonize him.
‘I’ll get there as soon as I can,’ she said when she had got control of her voice again. ‘My – my mother-in-law is organizing a plane. But I’m rather a long way away from home.’
‘Yes. So I understand. The Bahamas, I believe. Very nice.’
‘No,’ she said, her tears choking her. ‘No, it’s not very nice. It’s horrible. Well – thank you.’
‘That’s all right.’
‘When should I phone again?’
‘Oh, any time, any time at all. Now I have to go. My bleeper has just gone. Goodbye.’
Phaedria put the phone down. She looked out at the sea, the white sand, the palm trees in disbelief. How could anywhere be so beautiful, so calm, when her life was an ugly terrifying turmoil? If only Geoff would phone. Where was he, and how long would it take him to get her out of this awful, awful place? As she sat looking at the phone, willing it to ring, her head suddenly filled with a fresh horror. Roz had been up in Scotland. She would have known about the whole thing. She would have heard she had been in New York, would probably have asked what the number was. There was no way, no way on God’s earth that Roz would not know now that she had been in New York with Michael. And the awful irony was that now she need never, ever have known at all.
Phaedria rested her head on her arms and wept.
Geoff Partridge, who piloted the Morell family’s planes, had spent most of Christmas in bed in New York with a very pretty Pan American air hostess. He had been given an extended holiday, right up to the beginning of January; Phaedria had been privately relieved that he and the jet were in New York because it meant in an emergency he and the plane could be brought easily into service. He was staying at the Intercontinental; she imagined that he could be with her in a few hours that day of Letitia’s phone call. However, Geoff and his hostess had woken to a beautiful day, on that January 2nd, and decided to take a trip out to the Hamptons. He had to be in Nassau by the following evening; until then, barring accidents, he was officially clear. It was the Pan Am hostess’s last day; it seemed silly to sit around waiting for a call that probably wouldn’t come.
‘They have your number,’ she said, when he hesitated, ‘they can call you here. We’ll call in at lunch time, make sure if there’s a problem.’
‘OK.’
Only at lunch time they couldn’t find a public phone that was working; it was four o’clock before the Intercontinental managed to inform Geoff that he was required urgently to pilot the jet down to Nassau, and almost nine before he reached Kennedy and put the plane into service.
How Phaedria survived the ten-hour flight home she never afterwards knew. In the end she managed to get Julian’s small plane piloted out of Eleuthera and into Nassau and then catch a scheduled flight, an hour before a stricken Geoff Partridge arrived. She experienced for most of the time a panic so violent she could neither sit still nor walk up and down for more than a few seconds, but moved restlessly, endlessly from one seat to another, looking out of one window, then another, frantic for some relief from the choking pain. Occasionally she closed her eyes; then a picture of Julia in the incubator in the hospital in Los Angeles rose before her eyes, her tiny body white and still, and she would snap them open again, turning her head from side to side, biting her lips with the effort of not screaming. They offered her alcohol, coffee, food, in a hopeless attempt to find something, anything, that might help, if only for a moment, but she refused them all, even the thought of swallowing made her choke.
Letitia had promised faithfully that they would get a message to her on the plane’s radio if it was humanly possible and if there was any change in Julia’s condition; but as nothing came, Phaedria had no way of knowing whether there was no news, or if it simply had not managed to reach her. She wished now she had waited for Geoff, communication would have been a great deal more possible.
Mixed with her panic, her fear, was a terrible guilt and remorse: she should never, ever have left Julia with Nanny Hudson, never have ignored her cold, never been in one place when she said she was in another, never made herself so elusive. Well, Julia would die and that would be a judgement on her, a punishment, and there was no way, no way at all, that she could blame anyone except herself.
Roz couldn’t sleep the second night; she was haunted by thoughts of Phaedria, a battle raging in her between her hatred and sympathy for her; and by thoughts of Miles. She had avoided him all day, half ashamed that they should have experienced such pleasure, such happiness when Julia’s life was suspended so perilously, half consumed with longing to see him, be with him, have him again. They had met at mealtimes, which had in any case been strained, distracted occasions, everyone jumping whenever the phone rang; she had gone to bed early, pleading a headache. Letitia looked at her sharply; Roz never had headaches, never went to bed early, never felt tired. She looked at her watch; it was two o’clock. She decided to go down to Peveril’s library. She didn’t feel like reading, but he had some magnificent first editions, of Thackeray, Trollope, Burns. It would be amusing to look at those. She got up, pulled on her robe, and went quietly down to the great hall and into the library.
She was engrossed in The Eustace Diamonds when the door opened quietly; still half involved with the book, she turned round slowly. It was Miles.
‘Hi. Couldn’t you sleep? I guess we’re all pretty strung up.’
‘Yes. I keep thinking about Julia.’
‘I kept thinking about you.’
‘Miles, I – I don’t think we should carry on with this relationship. Not at all.’
‘OK.’ He shrugged, smiling at her. ‘If that’s what you want.’
‘Well it’s – it’s not what I want. But I just feel things are complicated enough. And there’s Candy.’
‘Roz, I told you last night, she’s three thousand miles away.’
Roz felt a mild irritation. ‘I know she is now. But she won’t always be. I don’t want to play any more of those games. And somehow this doesn’t seem quite the time for this kind of thing. And anyway, I don’t like our relationship being reduced to a one-night stand.’
‘Do we have a relationship?’
She felt foolish, disadvantaged.
‘No, of course not. You misunderstood me.’
‘Pity.’ He moved over, stood behind her, kissed her neck. ‘I was hoping we did.’
‘Miles, please don’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘I just told you why not.’
‘Oh Roz,’ he said, ‘you are much too serious. And besides . . .’ He was still behind her, he slipped his hands under her robe, moved them up to her breasts, started gently, tenderly massaging her nipples. Roz felt a lick of fire shoot down, in a white hot line, to her abdomen, her vagina; she squirmed, pressing her buttocks back against him. They were almost the same height; she felt his penis hard, pressing against her; she felt dizzy, odd. She fought to retain some self-control.
‘Besides what?’
‘You are just – well, sensational. I can’t think about anything else.’ His hands moved down, pressing, massaging her stomach, his fingers began to probe her pubic mound, seeking out, reaching into her, finding her clitoris. She put her head back against him and moaned.
‘Miles, please.’
‘Please what?’
‘You know what.’ She turned round, took his head in her hands, kissed him savagely, pulled off her robe. He entered her as she stood there, his hands on her buttocks, holding her to him, pushing, urging her into an almost instant orgasm. Roz cried out; the wild, strange cry oddly at variance with the sober quiet of the room.
Minutes later, she was lying on the floor, white faced, blazing eyed, holding out her arms; Miles knelt down, looking at her tenderly.
‘Tell you what,’ he said almost conversationally, as he sank into her again, ‘at least now it’s been a two-night stand.’
Pete Praeger met Phaedria at Heathrow; he said nothing, merely took her hand, as if he was an old friend, and led her to the car.
‘Do we – do we know any more?’
‘No more. She’s just about the same. Come on, we have to get you there.’
He drove so fast down to Eastbourne that Phaedria would, under normal circumstances, have been frightened; as it was, watching the speedometer needle on the Mercedes climb steadily from 90 to 100 to no, 115, she felt a strange relief. Neither of them spoke, just stared ahead.
As they reached the outskirts of Eastbourne he said, ‘This is bad, look at the traffic.’
‘Oh, Pete, just do what you can.’
‘I will.’ He put his foot down again, weaving in and out of the lanes, hooting; suddenly, inevitably, they heard the wailing of a police siren The police waved to Pete to move over; fuming, swearing, he got out.
‘Morning, sir. Do you know what speed you were doing then, in a built up area?’
‘Yes, officer. I do.’
‘Could I see your licence please, sir.’
Phaedria got out. She looked terrible, her face white, her eyes dark and shadowed, swollen with all the tears she had shed, her clothes crumpled.
‘Officer, please. Please let us go. I can explain.’
He looked at her, initially hostile, then sympathy dawning. ‘What is it?’
Phaedria took a deep breath. ‘My baby is very ill. In intensive care. I just flew in from the States. I have to get there. Mr Praeger was only doing what I asked.’
The policeman looked at her. He frowned, then he opened the door of the police car, his face impassive. ‘Get in, madam. You too, sir, if you’d be so kind.’
‘But I –’
‘Madam, please don’t waste time. You were only doing ninety. We can do a hundred and ten with the siren on.’
They were waiting for her when the police car drew up outside the hospital; they had radioed that they were coming. Eliza and Nanny Hudson, standing there. Phaedria fell out of the car. ‘Eliza, Nanny, what is it, what’s happened?’
Eliza looked at her, silent for a moment only, but to Phaedria it seemed like an hour, a week. Then she smiled. ‘Thank God you’re here. She’s all right. Phaedria, she’s going to be all right now, they think, but she needs you, she needs you so much. This is Mr Dugdale, he’s been so marvellous. Come on.’ And she took Phaedria’s hand, and pulled her, after Mr Dugdale, down the corridors, down the stairs and into a side ward, where Julia lay.
She was half asleep, she was breathing heavily, in her oxygen hood, restless, whimpering from time to time; as her mother came in she looked at her, and opened her large dark eyes very wide, and almost visibly relaxed, and smiled, a quiet, peaceful smile.
‘Oh, Julia,’ said Phaedria. ‘Oh, Julia.’
‘She’ll be all right now,’ said Mr Dugdale.
Letitia, beaming radiantly, went to find Roz, who was lying rather uncharacteristically on her bed.
‘Lovely, lovely news. Julia is going to be all right. She’s much better. She has to stay in hospital for a few days, but she’s all right. Phaedria’s safely back with her. Poor girl, that must have been a terrible twenty-four hours.’
‘I’m glad,’ said Roz, ‘really glad. It’s been a nightmare. I’m sorry I behaved so badly, Granny Letitia, I was distraught.’
‘That’s all right, darling. I understood. Come and have some lunch. Where’s Miles?’
‘Oh, talking to Peveril, I think. They get on really well. It’s so funny. Miles is planning to take him to Malibu.’
‘Well, I don’t think he’ll be able to do that unless he promises to take your mother as well. So are you feeling better, darling?’
‘Oh,’ said Roz, just a little too casually. ‘Much much better, thank you Letitia.’
Peveril was beaming at the table. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘good news at last, eh? I’ve hardly slept myself for two nights.’
‘Nor me,’ said Letitia, ‘I had to take a sleeping pill.’
‘Oh, you should never do that,’ said Peveril, relieved to have the conversation back on a normal plane, turned away from sickness and drama. ‘Dreadful things, those pills. Shouldn’t take them. I never take anything. Sleep like a baby, as long as I have my nightcap.’
‘What’s your nightcap?’ asked Roz interestedly.
‘Two hot toddies. They have to be good and strong, mind, two pegs of whisky in each one.’
‘What’s a peg?’ said Miles.
‘A large double. Chota peg is a single. Old Indian measure. My father always used the term.’
‘So you have four double whiskies before you go to sleep every night?’ said Roz incredulously.
‘That’s right. In hot milk, of course. Mind you, it doesn’t always work unless I have a couple of brandies after dinner. But I never take a pill. If I really can’t sleep I go out on the battlements and play the bagpipes for half an hour or so. Never fails.’
‘I must try that,’ said Letitia. ‘I often can’t sleep. Mind you, I daresay then the other inhabitants of Chelsea might have trouble sleeping.’
She sparkled at Peveril and he winked back at her. They were very fond of one another.
‘Stop flirting with my grandmother, Peveril,’ said Roz, laughing. ‘We don’t want anything like that in the family.’