‘It’s good to hear you, Susannah – and that British ringtone! I thought Mr Warren had kidnapped you forever.’
‘Are you out somewhere, Charles? Is this a bad time? Sorry to call on the mobile, but the landline wasn’t answering and no voicemail. Quite contrary of you, that.’
‘People like you can reach me and it saves a long list of tedious calls.’
‘People like me? Do you have a stable of lady friends?’
‘I wouldn’t put you in that category. I was thinking more of family, I’m a bit bogged down with mine right now, in Herefordshire, helping out Rose, my eldest, and here for a week or so yet, I fear. She knew I’d finished the book and she’s got problems. I had to come.’
‘Isn’t Rose the one who farms? Not serious problems, I hope?’
‘Not desperately. Her mother-in-law, who’s a boozer, has had a bad fall, and Rose’s father-in-law is half-blind, so she’s helping with the driving and meals. Only problem, the in-laws live in Scotland and I’ve been hauled in to help out here on the farm while Rose is away; I feed the hens, cats, dogs – who snarl at my Ollie very inhospitably – and mind my sixteen-year-old granddaughter too, who’s hanging loose in the holidays while her father’s out rounding up sheep. When did you get back? I wasn’t expecting you till mid-August – if at all.’
‘Come on, Charles! You knew I was doing up a house for the client, not myself. Warren Lindsay’s fine, very friendly, but it was a summer commission, nothing more. And anyway, Daisy was younger.’ It helped, knowing her decision, and that was all the honesty Charles was going to get.
‘I got in this morning,’ I said, ‘but slept all afternoon, which is why I’m badgering you now, saying hello at midnight. The job went well. Daisy’s fun and works hard; she’s stayed on a few days to wind things up’ – in more ways than one, I thought – ‘but will be home in a week. I’m going to suggest setting up together; she can do all the sloggy stuff and I can put my feet up now and then.’
‘You don’t need to work. But you’re being very big-hearted towards Daisy. I’m impressed.’
Little did he know quite how good to her I was being, but all my wrathful frustration was directed at myself.
‘If you’re going to carry on, though,’ Charles continued, ‘it’s definitely no bad thing to have her along. I might get more of a look-in too, and I’d like that.’
‘Working, which I enjoy, and seeing you aren’t mutually exclusive. And anyway, you’re up there communing with your house, you can’t push it all onto me. When do you leave Rose’s? When do we meet? Will you detour to London on your way back up North?’
‘East, Norfolk is east. Soon, I hope. She’s trying to sort something out for the in-laws. Still, what’s another week or two after all these fallow Warren months? I’m in waiting mode. Patiently hanging fire while you fraternized with your Lord of the Long Island.’
‘You were finishing a book! You do try it on. Glad you have, by the way – congrats! It’s been a long time coming. So if I’m not going to see you for a while I may take off to my house in the South of France. August’s not the best, but it’s a haven of quiet once I’m there, even so close to Mougins. Cypresses, pines, olives, you’d like it. You have dog-walkers in your life, don’t you? You go away; you go to China. Perhaps you’ll make it as far as France one of these days. I wouldn’t mind getting more of a look-in either.’
‘You’ll see a fair bit of me soon; I’m working on it. Two weeks? I’ll come to the flat?’
‘Sounds good. And Charles . . . have you missed me?’
That wasn’t cool, said with too much feeling, showing the vulnerability I was fighting, which wasn’t part of the deal. We kept it to light banter, Charles and I, it was how we’d lasted so long. All through his wife, who’d led him a dance before popping off, my run of husbands; we’d had some sex in the in-between times. it was a very solid friendship.
‘Daily,’ Charles said cheerfully. ‘I’ve missed you daily.’
‘It’s late, I’m keeping you up,’ I said briskly, keen to sound back on top. ‘I’m sure the cock crows inconsiderately early down on the farm. Remember the Austrian Ambassador, years ago, when we were trying to leave a party? “You Englishmen are all the same, early to bed and up with zee cock!”’
‘And you should try to get some sleep after that flight,’ Charles said. ‘Talk soon.’
I was stupidly close to tears. I’d felt in need of a fond, supportive reunion; it had been a morale-bashing last few days. And two whole weeks – would the mood be as good then as in the first flush of a homecoming? Charles didn’t need a clinging oldie, he wanted someone to laugh with, someone positive, a strong-willed entertaining friend.
He saw me in that light now. He’d wanted me to move in with him. He’d pressed the delights of a freezing house in Norfolk – possibly knowing it wasn’t for me. True, I could have insulated it and put in a fancy new boiler, but in a way the charm of a house like that was that it hadn’t been hacked about with predictable interior designer zeal.
England’s east coast was crumbling, falling into the sea, being pushed westward. I didn’t want to face the tail end of howling gales whistling over from the Siberian Steppes every time I put my nose out of the door. I wasn’t hardy, I wanted convenience stores, my snooty little cat and the London theatre.
I let out a dribble of a tear, couldn’t help it, sniffed and climbed into bed. I was aching all over, desperately tired yet restless and awake.
Hadn’t I used Charles over the years? I’d always taken him for granted. Charles would cheer me up, Charles would fill in the gaps. I’d been flitting around the sophisticated hotspots, soaking up any appreciation going, obsessed with my career all over again. He understood me, though, and had always seemed to put up with my selfishness and flaws. He hadn’t teased me when I’d owned up about Daisy, which a lesser man couldn’t have resisted doing. But Charles had that quality. He seldom let his own feelings show, which made it harder to be sensitive to them. The signs of touchy jealousy he’d shown over my summer flirt with Warren were rare.
I wasn’t entirely sure what I was so upset about. After all, I’d see Charles before long. Stephanie, my saint of a secretary, had fattened up Posh, my skinny little puss, filled the flat with flowers and kept all the paperwork in order. Everything was hunky-dory and tickety-boo. I had my children and grandchildren to see, a pile of invitations from September onwards, and the prospect of an unwinding week in my own home in the South of France.
Bella was coming with Rory and the girls, my twelve and fifteen-year-old granddaughters, for the second half of the month. It was ideal, a few days on my own and a little time with the family. Strange to think that Bella was nine years older than Daisy – strange, and rather daunting. Not a thought for the wrong end of the day.
At Nice airport I queued with the August holidaymakers to pick up the hire car. Arriving there never failed to stir potent and moving thoughts of my parents. It was fifty years since the first time, coming with them to the South of France, my father recovering from a heart attack, Matt chasing. I treasured the memory of the happiness those few days gave my parents and queued for the car with a large lump in my throat.
An argument had broken out at the counter, a red-faced father shouting his head off. He’d paid in England, they needn’t think they could try that on . . . He elbowed his sighing wife out of the way like a rude man at a theatre bar, while the grumbles behind him grew louder. ‘For God’s sake, it’s only the insurance,’ someone yelled. ‘Just get on with it!’
We hadn’t queued fifty years ago. I’d driven straight off, very cautiously, to St Paul de Vence.
Those few days at the cottage on the hillside, the sunshine, luminous light, distant steeples and silver seas, had brought a quality of peace to what little was left of Dad’s life, images for him to hold onto and store away in his soul. He’d lived for a year and a half more, surviving another heart attack, and died at the age of fifty-two, six weeks after I’d married Max. He’d known Bella but not the grandsons to come, Josh and Al. He hadn’t known that I’d failed a second time, nor that I’d found true happiness in my third marriage, with Edward.
My mother’s dignity at the time of Dad’s dying had moved me almost as much as his loss, seeing her sitting stiffly, looking into a private distance, managing to stave off a collapse. She’d had no one with her when he’d had a massive final attack – not the doctor, not me. I couldn’t have made it in time and my brother was abroad; she’d had to cope alone. When I arrived and held her hand, she’d said I looked golden, a light in the dark.
We’d grieved, Mum and I, leaned on each other, and then our worlds gradually moved on. Mine had been full, a kaleidoscope of high excitements, troubled lows; hers had been one long struggle, scrimping, teaching, carving out a life with a few local friends. Being there for me.
Now, she was no longer there to turn to, to call daily, to shop for and help with the indignities of old age – to be by her side, mumbling my love for her as she slipped away. It had been a year after Edward had died – more numbing pain, the loss of a mother I loved completely. It was the kind of pain that dulls, but never goes away – it becomes embedded too deep. Clive, my fourth husband, had been gentle elderly support in our short time together, before he too was another loss to grieve.
I reached the head of the queue, collected my car and drove to the house where Michel, the ancient weathered gardener, and his tiny wrinkled wife, were on greeting parade. The garden was thriving in the dry heat: crinum lilies, lime-green fennel, tall spiky cardoons swaying lightly, whose deep blue-mauve thistle-heads, Michel assured me, were edible. A more delicate flavour than their cousin, the artichoke, he said, just pricklier; the French grew them in vegetable patches and wrapped the heads in brown paper.
It was an eighteenth-century stone farmhouse that Clive had bought years previously. We’d had a happy month there, a sixth of our short marriage, before he’d died and left me all that he owned. I hoped, in another life, he’d forgive me for turning the interior upside down and putting in a feast of mod cons.
Neighbours called. I drank with them and also alone, sipping chilled rosé on the terrace. The evenings were pink-gold: they seemed to have absorbed the daytime brilliance to slant out in concentrated, softer form, long pleats of light across the garden. The heavy scent of pines and cypresses surrounded me in this scene of Mediterranean serenity, distant Alps and the sea.
I thought backwards. Of Matt, wondering what had happened to him, whether he’d married, stayed married. Had his elderly Bostonian fan left him the cottage in St Paul de Vence? Was he there now, in his seventies, drinking and reminiscing? The Ferrones had soon lost touch with him. They were long gone, sadly, my mothering Manhattan Mom and kind Walter with his wobbly jowls.
As was Sinatra and poor, defenceless Marilyn Monroe, worshipped by the world and lost to it before she was forty. Jack Kennedy and Bobby, Martin Luther King, all cruelly wiped out in their prime. They’d staked a claim on history at least, and taken steps along the rocky path to progress. We owed them much.
Gil had died recently as well. I’d seen a feature on him in a New York newspaper supplement a year or two back that had paid homage with a spread of his work. I was in two of the photographs, one with Bella, soft-focus, heads touching. The blurb talked of the soft intimacy captured. I had that picture: it was fading fast, framed and hanging over a filing cabinet. Another lump in my throat, a grieving ache, long ago as it was.
Joe had died over a decade ago now, in California. He’d had so many hang-ups, not least his constant need for kicks and the highlife, and his corrosive envy – especially of fellow actors like Peter O’Toole and Terence Stamp, who’d succeeded big-time in films. There was no greater boozer than Peter, yet he’d achieved stardom, while the drink had stunted Joe’s life and career. Still, he’d remarried and straddled his crises; he’d got by.
After five days of perfect peace, Bella, Rory and the girls arrived. The house was soon jumping, with noise and giggles, loud CDs, cooking smells, wet towels and slippery footprints on tiled floors. We ate out sometimes and I suggested going early to La Colombe d’Or one evening, walking in the medieval village while it was still light.
I hadn’t been back for nearly fifty years. The memories were so poignant, but now I felt able to cope. Any shame over Matt had faded to nothingness.
The road up from the coast seemed wider and the land, the sleepy countryside, was a built-up mass of villas, enclaves – a different world. I couldn’t even make out the cottage. The fortress village was unchanged, despite the teeming tourists squeezing up the steep stone alleyways. There was serious art to be had, though; not all the shops were draped in tat. And La Colombe d’Or was as exquisite as I remembered – with its curtaining ivy and nestling Léger mural on the terrace where we ate – the age and beauty of the place. The food was perhaps more consciously gourmet, the paintings – Picasso, Utrillo, Duffy, Miró, Matisse – still all there, part of the furniture, the history. I’d stayed away too long.
I flew home after a few precious days with the family, aware that grandmothers could smother, and sons-in-law needed holiday privacy. I wondered about Charles. He’d sent witty texts, mainly about the teenager and the straw-behind-ear boyfriends whom he’d had to shoo away like the hens poking their heads in at the kitchen door. He’d called too, and while not being distant or cool, he’d still left me with a sense of remoteness, as if he had things on his mind, elsewhere thoughts. It was unsettling.
With my new electronic passport, I was away from Heathrow in no time. In the taxi, I turned on my phone and saw that I had an unknown voicemail message.
Susannah dearest, it’s Warren. I’m here, staying at Claridges, briefly. I need to talk to you, to see you. I ’d heard from your PA that you were due to return from France today. Are you back yet – can I call by? Please say yes – or tell me when is a good time.
What on earth had got into Warren?
Daisy was in London, back over a week now. She’d phoned from the States and said the deed was done and that telling Warren hadn’t been quite the agony she’d feared. I was intrigued, impatient to hear more. She’d texted me in France, too; apologies for disturbing my holiday, but she was sooo bursting to give me the full lowdown. Could she perhaps come round when I was back home? I knew she had her future on her mind.
I’d have liked to see Daisy before Warren, to be primed and properly filled in, but he’d seemed a bit desperate in that whiny voicemail. Perhaps it was only fair to see him quickly while he was here. He’d implied coming over specially, yet knowing Warren he was sure to be combining it with some business interest; he mapped his life that way. It was a tantalising twist, a call from Warren – the last thing I’d expected. The summer saga not yet quite put to bed, it seemed.
Home by eight o’clock, I unpacked and settled in before phoning Warren. I couldn’t face him coming round that night. Charles might even appear.
Warren answered instantly. ‘Hello, hello?’ He sounded very staccato and on edge.
‘I found your voicemail,’ I said. ‘It was quite a surprise. What’s brought you over?’
‘You, Susannah. I need to talk, and thought the only thing to do was to take action and grab a plane. Can I take you to dinner?’ He sounded really worked up, but too bad. He could wait a few hours; he’d given me enough aggro. I’d felt virtuous even answering his call.
‘I’m a bit whacked tonight, Warren, just got in. Let’s make it tomorrow.’
‘Even just a drink? I’m going spare, alone in the hotel. It’s full of tourists in sneakers.’
‘Sorry, Warren, not tonight. why don’t you give Jimmy Rose a call? I’m sure he’d love a catch-up. You could tell him that, having met me at his drinks party – what is it, nearly three years ago now – I’ve been out all summer doing your Southampton house. Jimmy’s around, busy writing a political exposé, which should scatter a few pigeons over here.’
Warren seemed happier, given something to do and with a time fixed to come by next day. It was mid-week in the middle of August, not a lot happening. Lunch at one of the outdoor cafés in nearby Duke of York Square might be an idea if the weather held. I wanted to keep the meeting local – and short.
I called Daisy in the morning with the news of Warren’s odd, unexpected hop-over. ‘He’s probably come all the way to London to cry on my shoulder about you and ask if he should get in touch. It’s a bit of a liberty! I take it you don’t want me to pass anything on, and that you’re not having second thoughts? He’s at Claridges, if you are.’
‘God, no. No way! But I’m sure it’s not about me anyway. I must tell you – I’ve held off with Simon so far, stopped him coming round. And he’s in Cornwall this week.’
‘We’d better have that chat you want soon then, so I can keep stiffening your resolve. No sagging backbones allowed. He’ll be more trouble when he’s through with family holidays and back at work again, and we can’t have him camping on your doorstep, wearing you down. How’s Friday morning?’
‘It’d be fantastic. I’m terrifically grateful. And perhaps we can share notes about Warren,’ she added shyly – as well she might.
Walking into the living room of my penthouse flat, Warren looked round carefully, cautiously, like someone who has seen too many spy-thrillers. He needed the familiar, to know the parameters of a room, where the doors were. I could imagine him always double-checking the exits on a plane, front and back. The room, the whole flat, was sunny and splendid – hardly a penthouse to him, of course, being only five floors up – but it was new territory.
Warren’s eyes had made their circuit. They were back on me now and he seemed unsure whether to smile, even. He was unusually tense.
‘Champagne?’ I had a bottle of Bollinger in my hands.
‘Mineral water, if you don’t mind. I’m on a new regime – no alcohol before six. It’s hard to stick to, but I hate to gain weight – it’s bad for longevity!’ His smile was a relief, he was sounding like an American abroad. He gazed out of the window. ‘So much green space. London’s full of surprises.’
‘That’s Burton Court,’ I said, ‘cricket and tennis and stuff. It’s great having it there.’
Warren followed me to the drinks table, standing oppressively close as I poured Perrier over a glassful of ice. I had the same without ice. I handed him his and went with mine to an armchair. He came to the one beside it, leaned over the table between us and held my eyes. I could smell the faint residue of a perfumed soap on his hands.
‘I had to come, had to see you. I’d made such an unbelievably dreadful fool of myself over Daisy.’ He kept up his gaze. ‘I mean, asking her to marry me! I’d felt nothing for her, no more than a typical urge, that stupid sexual itch men have to learn to control.’ I raised an eyebrow, wondering when that would be. ‘I was blinded, Susannah. I had floaters in my eyes, faulty vision. It was male hubris, kidding myself that I could mould her to my lifestyle. I mean, she’d be decorative, a sweet docile young wife at my side, but not a real mate.’
I felt a need to defend Daisy. The whole point of her was her spark; Simon could subdue it, of course, but only with brute force.
‘I’d hardly call Daisy docile!’ I said. ‘Aren’t you rather doing her down?’ I stood up, feeling slightly bored. I’d made a fool of myself, too – and didn’t need reminding of it. All this was a waste of time: there was nothing more to be said.
‘How about a spot of lunch?’ I went on. ‘It was generous of you to come to explain, but it was only a near-mistake, after all, not one you actually made, or so I gather. I’d put it all behind you now, since I assume none of your friends knew and nobody’s any the wiser.’ I suspected that Warren had dropped a few broad hints, but he’d cover his back, he could say what he liked about Daisy. And would do, I was sure.
‘Do you mind a short walk to one of the local cafés?’ I suggested. ‘They have outside tables and I thought perhaps a light salad lunch – good for your new regime. I mustn’t be too long. Stephanie’s just gone on holiday, now that I’m back, and I need to be at my desk.’
Warren looked strangely panicked. I wondered why. He was in a dark suit, a safe, striped tie; dressed for a city meeting, but obviously not in a rush. He’d probably had a business breakfast.
‘Susannah,’ he leaned forward again, ‘I can’t talk privately over a café table and I must say what I need to, what I’ve come to say – even if it makes you justifiably angry. There’s no easy way to put this, but it’s just that, well, you see . . .’ he drew a breath. ‘The full misery of what I’ve been living with is that I asked the wrong woman.’
He bowed his head. Looking up coyly he said, ‘I knew instantly. I felt sick as a dog, out on the ocean with Elmer next day, and it had nothing to do with the swell. I was lousy company for Daisy, the evening you left as well. I took her to the Meadow Club and sat in a stew of gloom, wondering what the hell to do . . .’
It did indeed make me angry. I wasn’t in the business of being anyone’s second choice, certainly not Warren’s. I wasn’t that desperate, even at my grand old age. It was a load of baloney anyway. If he’d known that quickly, he’d have done something about it, not left it to Daisy to see her personal light.
Warren studied his neatly clipped nails; he had them manicured weekly. He looked up. ‘Would you, Susannah dearest, consider coming out for a couple more weeks – to relax, not to work, of course; no pressure, just as a good friend? It’ll be Labor Day in Southampton. Everyone’s around, I know they’d all want to see you . . .’
He was newly into pregnant pauses. His eyes were limpid like a pleading child’s, begging to be allowed out. He’d broken the back of his homework, presented his mea culpa face, made a tentative start at reparation and now wanted the girl next door to come out to play mummies and daddies. Warren was pretty transparent, as I well knew after a couple of months of a non-admitted-to ménage. I felt determined to cling onto a bit of dignity and not let fly; no stroppy, loss-of-face bitching. I’d leave that to his ex-wife.
‘That’s no go, I’m afraid, Warren. There’s no chance of my coming over, not least because of Stephanie’s holiday. And while you may have decided you fell the wrong way, that’s hardly going to inspire me with any great confidence. It doesn’t mean you’d have felt it a right decision if you’d fallen the other way in the first place! You’re set in your ways and lifestyle, too, and by the same token, understandably at our age, so am I in mine.
‘My life’s here in London. We’re not in love, after all – which is not to say we’re too old, nor that there isn’t a fulfilling relationship out there waiting to happen. Yet from one who’s made many mistakes in her time, I’d advise you to hold your horses.’
Warren was looking more and more hunted and I eased up a bit. ‘I appreciate all you’ve said, and taking the trouble to make this trip, though perhaps you’ve managed to combine it with a little business?’ He flushed, always so easy to read. ‘Anyway, I’ve got an off-the-wall suggestion for you, if you’d like. Let’s go for a bite and I’ll try it out on you.’
He took my hand and squeezed it as we started out round Burton Court. ‘Friends?’
‘Of course. Oh, and how was last night with Jimmy, by the way? All good there?’
Jimmy had called me that morning to thank me warmly; he’d managed to get Warren to buy up quantities of his wine company’s top-notch stock.
‘Very convivial,’ Warren said. ‘He’s invited himself out to Great Maples next summer – to see the transformation, he said, the fruits of Susannah’s stay. Tell me this suggestion of yours, though. Don’t keep me hanging fire.’
I’d kept up a brisk pace to Duke of York Square and made for the Saatchi Art Gallery’s outdoor café. ‘It’s to do with Willa,’ I said, as we sat down at a table. ‘She’s not out of your system yet, Warren. Anyone else in your life is by way of a passing affair.’
His mouth hung open. He shut it hurriedly, self-consciously, his eyes darting about. He never let go of appearances; ‘convention’ was his middle name. No one was looking; only shoppers gossiping, a young couple flirting, a bearded loner fixing people with hopeful gazes. An artist? Willing everyone to go into the Gallery and admire his paintings?
Warren was more in control now – wary and on the defensive. ‘I don’t know what you mean by that, Susannah.’ He impatiently waved away a tall thin girl offering bread rolls.
‘Hear me out,’ I said. ‘Keep an open mind. Daisy told me about Willa coming up in a restaurant, you see, and the crumbly old bore she was with. She hasn’t found her match, Warren, obviously, and I’m sure she’d be more amenable to an overture from you than you’d think. She wouldn’t take you so much for granted, second time round either, having had her bluff called and seen your tough, don’t-cross-me-or-else side. You were bitter, sure, but I’d thought when we met that you protested it a little over-much. It seemed more a case of bruised pride – on both sides – than being simply bored and out of love.’
‘Wouldn’t your pride have been bruised, if you’d been constantly belittled and put down?’ Warren demanded. He looked insulted, deeply injured and all the more on the defensive.
‘But you still care, be honest with yourself. And you’d be in command this time round, Warren, and able to call the shots. You can give her a lifestyle she loves . . . I think she’d bite.’
‘But the house!’ he exclaimed, hit by the thought. ‘All your work, the plans, the orders in train; everything would have to be stopped – and the cancellation fees involved! I mean, just imagine!’ True to form he was instantly into financial practicalities while not dismissing an approach to Willa out of hand.
‘Why cancel the conversion? Go ahead with it, do the work. Don’t tell her. Willa needn’t see the house till Christmas or next summer anyway. You could say you did it for her as a surprise! She’d see you were far from in a decorative rut, which you’ve said she complained about, and if she likes to be the centre of attention, allow in the magazines to do features. They’d want to, there’d be a lot of interest.
‘Give it some thought,’ I said. ‘Examine your feelings, and if you do decide to ask her out and see how it goes, take it slowly, won’t you? Plan your strategy like a business deal.’
Warren’s mouth was open again, he’d forgotten about appearances. He was thinking hard, staring at me as if I was completely off with the fairies – yet probably, I suspected, weighing up the risk-to-gain ratio even as his head was in spinning confusion.
‘Are your children and grandchildren home from Europe yet?’ I enquired, and he gave an absent nod. ‘Why not have them out for Labor Day weekend?’ I suggested, mindful of his need for company. ‘The work isn’t due to start till the Wednesday afterwards. Now can you catch that waitress’s eye, do you think? I really mustn’t be long.’
Daisy breezed in, looking fit for the front row of a fashion show, confident and classy, smelling deliciously of some soft rich decadent perfume. Balenciaga? Warren bounty?
‘It’s fabulous to see you,’ she said, ‘and of you to let me come.’
Her arms were dropping off with all the carriers and panniers she was carrying; she’d brought enough home cooking to stock a farmer’s market. More of her fresh baked bread, which smelled intoxicating, sexy little cupcakes with a nipple-like glazed raspberry on top, a tub of her scrumptious marmalade ice cream. Tomato chutney, red Thai curry . . .
‘I make the curry with chicken thighs,’ she said, as we went into the kitchen with it all. ‘It’s quite tasty. I just thought perhaps you could use a few bits with Stephanie away. Hello, Posh! Doesn’t she look well? Silly little puss cat, aren’t you?’ Daisy bent to muss her fur affectionately. Posh lapped up the fuss, which she seldom did; she was Siamese, it must be the Thai curry.
‘You’ve gone quite mad,’ I said. ‘There’s enough food here for a week! And the smell of that bread . . . Well, let’s look at you then. That’s some necklace. Great with the shirt; you do get it together, Daisy. The handbag’s not so dusty either.’
‘Warren insisted on buying up half Southampton. I’d told him not to before I’d made up my mind, how embarrassed about it I felt all round. He was just showing off, wanting to remind me how rich he was. He shopped for himself, too.’
Daisy was trying to tread sensitively while only underlining how conclusively I’d been Secondhand Rose. It blew Warren’s cover over being a misery at the Meadow Club; he’d hardly been that, strutting up Southampton’s Main Street with the bouncy young Daisy on his arm. I was past caring, all the more fascinated to hear it from her side.
‘We’ve got plenty to talk about,’ I said. ‘There’s a proposition I want to put to you and notes to share about Warren. I’m dying to hear all! Let’s have coffee and some of that irresistible bread.’
I ground the beans, which along with the fresh-baked aroma and Daisy’s scent produced an orgy of delectable smells. And finding some damson conserve in the back of the cupboard we got stuck in, feet up at the telly end of the kitchen, gorging ourselves silly.
‘You look terrific,’ Daisy said, in her typically gushy way. ‘So rested. The sun’s blonded your hair and I adore your stripy trousers, they’re so cool. Um, did you see Warren yet? I just wondered what brought him over?’
‘It wasn’t actually you, Daisy. He started by pouring out the apologies then got round to asking me back out to Long Island – to hold his hand! I resisted telling him what a filthy cheek he had and suggested he was still hooked on his ex-wife, the toughie cow, dangling the idea of him taking up with her again. He was in shock, horror at the thought, but didn’t rule it out. He’s gone off now, to do profit and loss columns on Willa!’ I grinned. ‘So tell me how you managed to extricate yourself and turn away your billionaire.’
‘It was surprisingly easy,’ Daisy said. ‘Elmer Harvey helped, coming staggering up to our dinner table, drunk as a raisin in rum. All the nods and winks when I’d asked him not to, Warren’s bragging and swagger as though I were the victim of a takeover; it was too much. It crystallized my decision. And as the week wore on, Warren genuinely seemed to see for himself that he’d been a bit carried away with the imagined pleasures of a dolly bird at his side. He’d muttered about lawyers and premarital contracts too, which hardened my resolve. I’d rather kiss goodbye to all the billions in America than marry on contractual terms. I encouraged him in downside thinking as best I could. Little things like reminding him without actually saying so, how set in his ways he was, that his bedroom wouldn’t look quite the same, no more staid orderliness in his life; girls spread themselves, they had a lot of stuff.
‘He was still so infuriatingly pleased with himself, though, and . . .’ Daisy hesitated, tailing off with a slow-rising blush.
‘And? You can’t stop there.’
She was in it, stuck, no backtracking, whatever it was, and looked distinctly sheepish.
‘Well, this gets a bit personal, Susannah, but you see, I tried on a wheeze . . . He was way out of puff after going at it on the first night, so I decided to have a bit of fun and try to make him see that he wasn’t quite the testosterone-tops boyo he thought himself. Men are so sensitive in that area and I reckoned he was twitchy anyway, worrying about being able to keep me in the sexual manner to which I was accustomed. He wouldn’t want me to have a second helping elsewhere. So I set about putting him through his paces. I did have a little wobble at one stage – a momentary panic vision of, well, coitus permanently interruptus, if you get what I mean. It does happen! I’ve read about it.’
I had to smile – although I couldn’t help feeling a pang of sympathy for poor Warren, as exhausted, by the sound of it, as a mating male lion keeping at it for days on end. ‘It’s a new slant on getting his comeuppance,’ I said. ‘Quite fitting really.’
Daisy giggled. ‘Anyway, when I told Warren that, sad and wretched as it was, I knew in my bones my true home was in London, he quickly assured me that he quite understood. He even patted his chest, saying perhaps it was for the best. He had to have a mind to his health these days, the old ticker and all that – the worry of getting old before his time.’
It explained the new longevity regime. The phone had been ringing and we needed to get going. ‘More coffee, Daisy? Want to hear my proposition now?’
‘Yes, please. I’ve been a bit shy to ask. It’s made me keep wittering on, I’m afraid.’
‘I wondered if you’d like to set up together? Partners. I’d bring in the business and you’d do most of the work. I’d like to start doing a little less now. It would be a chance to build up your skills, but it would be full on, not much time for cooking!’
‘Never in my wildest dreams . . .’ Daisy was off into a sea of superlatives, eyes shining like the evening star; her enthusiasm was a joy.
‘It’s hard work, it takes dedication, slog and perseverance – no running home to put on the corset for Simon.’
‘No,’ she said, ‘but I’ll be out of the house all day, so he can sit on the doorstep and whistle for it. I feel stronger, Susannah, properly over the beastly divorce now. I had a call from Gerald, the auctioneer, as well, which was cheering. He’s coming over in September, wants to take me to the opera, and has a friend he wants me to meet.’
‘And there’s always my forty-year-old son, Josh, whom I’m dying to see married! We’ll get together and sort all the work details very soon, Daisy, but right now I need to hit the phone. And my friend Charles is turning up later, so I want to titivate myself up a bit. Your food cornucopia couldn’t come in handier. He can have one of those sexy little cupcakes with his tea.’