There was a silence. Francesca spoke first. ‘I forgave you a long time ago, Katharine. I just never forgot, that’s all.’
‘Please, could you say the actual words to me?’ Katharine asked softly.
‘I forgive you,’ Francesca replied, her tone an echo of Katharine’s.
‘Thank you, Frankie. That means a lot to me. More than you will ever know.’ Katharine looked at Nick, waiting.
His eyes met hers, blue impaled blue. He said, ‘Unlike Francesca, I had never forgiven you, Katharine. But I do forgive you now. How could I not? You have shown immense courage today, facing us the way you have.’
‘Thank you, Nicky. Thank you so very, very much.’ Katharine went to the window, blinking, feeling the prick of tears. She composed herself, swung round to them. ‘Is there any possibility that we might all be friends again?’ Something in their faces warned her not to press this point, and she murmured, ‘Well, perhaps it’s too soon for that, too much to expect at this moment.
Chapter Fifty
Katharine came out of the Seventy-Sixth Street entrance of the Carlyle, nodded to the doorman and walked briskly down the street. She crossed Madison Avenue and made her way towards Fifth, sauntering in the direction of the Frick a few blocks away. During lunch at the hotel she had asked Estelle to go with her to view one of her favourite art collections, but the journalist had a deadline and had had to return to her office.
It was a sparkling afternoon, cold but sunny and crisp and the sky was an unblemished blue and there was an electricity in the air. Manhattan electricity, Katharine thought. There really is no other city like it in the whole world. I am glad I came back. It has revitalized me. To her, London was masculine, comforting, smacked of leather and tweeds and log fifes, whilst Paris was feminine, beguiling, evoked silks and satins and fragrant scents and candlelight. Ah, but Manhattan, she mused, it’s androgynous, neither male nor female. She raised her head, looked up and then around her. Canyons of steel and shimmering glass and yellow cabs and Cadillacs. New York… it was the glitter of diamonds, the bubbles in champagne, the sleekness of mink and sable. It had a pulse, a beat, a special tempo, was challenging, exciting and utterly unique. My favourite city of all the cities I’ve known, she added under her breath.
She continued to observe as she strolled along, thinking how vibrant and alive everything seemed. But then the entire world looked different to her these days, for she saw it now through clearer, more perceptive eyes. Her mind strayed to Nick and Francesca, and she wondered if she would ever hear from them again. She hoped she would. If she did not she would be sad, but the decision about renewing their friendship was out of her hands, and she refused to speculate. She had recently taught herself to concentrate on the business at hand and of the moment, not to look to the future. The future was an imponderable.
She smiled to herself as she went into the building where the Frick Collection was housed. Beau worried about the future, her future anyway. He had called on Monday evening, anxious to know about her progress in New York, her immediate plans. She had told him of her chance encounter with Nick and Frankie at lunch that day, and he had sounded pleased they had met with her. However, she knew he was worrying excessively about her meeting with Mike Lazarus at five o’clock today, which she had mentioned in passing.
Katharine herself was no longer concerned. She felt calm, in control, and purposeful. And she was not going to dwell on Michael Lazarus. Before she left London, Dr Moss had reminded her she must not endeavour to solve problems before they presented themselves. Anticipatory despair, he had called it. And that, according to the renowned psychiatrist, was one of the chief causes of the debilitating anxiety she had lived with most of her life. How wonderful Edward Moss had been to her over the years. She owed her recovery, her very sanity, to him.
Well, I’ve come to look at paintings, to enjoy a little beauty, not contemplate illness, Katharine told herself firmly, and went through into the room where the Fragonards hung. For the next thirty minutes she moved around slowly, gazing at the art, entranced by the breathtaking portraiture and landscapes, which seemed to her to have a vitality and sensuousness that was unrivalled. No wonder Fragonard is considered to be one of the greatest painters of the eighteenth century, she thought, standing back, her head on one side.
‘Fragonard originally intended those panels for Madame du Barry, you know.’
‘Nick!’ Startled to hear his voice, Katharine spun around swiftly. He stood a few feet away, a trenchcoat slung over his arm. He was smiling at her and she saw at once that his eyes were mild and friendly, the hostility of two days ago washed away. She returned his smile, and he stepped forward, took her hand, leaned over and kissed her cheek in the most natural manner.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked.
‘The same as you… looking at paintings. Aren’t they extraordinary?’
She turned to regard the panels. ‘Yes. Now that kind of talent truly fills me with awe.’
‘Yes,’ he said, positioning himself next to her. ‘Our contributions to the arts do seem puny in comparison.’
‘Tell me about Madame du Barry.’ Her eyes turned to his face.
‘Oh yes. Fragonard had intended them for her, when she was the mistress of King Louis XV of France. But the King died, Louis XVI ascended to the throne, and she retired to the country. The Revolution came and ruined Fragonard, who was essentially a court painter. He went to live in Grasse, where he decorated the house of a friend with these panels. They’re called “Progress of Love,” and as you can see they depict love and gallantry of the period most beautifully. I can look at them for hours, endlessly fascinated by the exquisite detail.’
‘I can too. And Madame du Barry? I can’t remember my French history—whatever happened to her?’
‘She was eventually arrested by the Revolutionary Tribunal on charges of treason, trumped up, of course. She died on the guillotine at the age of fifty. Not an enviable way for such a beauty to die. Gruesome really.’
‘Yes.’ A faint shadow struck Katharine’s face fleetingly, and then she laughed. ‘You know so much about history.’
‘I studied it at Oxford, remember? And I’m blessed with a photographic memory. Come on, let’s stroll around,’ he said, taking her arm.
He told her more about Fragonard, and Madame du Barry and Louis XV, and he answered her questions with cordiality, warmth even, and she was astonished at the absence of awkwardness between them. Suddenly he changed the impersonal to the personal.
Nick said, ‘It’s not a coincidence… running into you like this. I was just talking about you a little while ago. With Estelle. I called her. Looking for you. She said you were coming here.’
‘Oh.’
‘Frankie also tried to ’phone you earlier today but your line was busy, and she had to rush out. She’s buying a Laurencin painting and then going to Virginia. She plans to call you when she gets back early next week.’
‘I’d like that.’ There was a slight hesitation, and then Katharine murmured, ‘I’ve carried a terrible burden of guilt about Frankie for years. She accused me of ruining her life, and that has weighed heavy. She is all right, isn’t she? She is happy?’
He smiled wryly. ‘I don’t like that word much. It’s so meaningless. What’s happiness?’ His shoulders lifted in a shrug. ‘But I’m sure she’s happier than most people. She has a nice life, Harrison’s a good guy. But she feels badly about the other day. Frankie thinks she didn’t finish your unfinished business.’
‘I’m not sure I understand…’
‘She believes you’ve suffered a lot, considers her accusation to have been unwarranted in a sense, made in anger, in the heat of the moment all those years ago. Frankie said to me today that no one ruins another person’s life, that we are ultimately responsible for our own destinies. She said if anyone is to blame, it is she herself, for not trusting the man she loved, for condemning him without a hearing, repudiating him out of hand. Frankie takes full respo
nsibility for her life, and I think she wants you to know that, Katharine. She’s been worrying because she didn’t say enough to you, or explain this, from what I gather. She asked me if I thought you truly understood that she’s not harbouring a grudge. You do, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’ There was a hesitation again, before Katharine stated, ‘You are though, aren’t you?’ Harbouring grudges, I mean.’
‘Maybe.’ The furrow deepened on his brow. ‘But I realized last night that I don’t hate you any more.’ He exhaled heavily. ‘Hatred is such a wasted emotion, like the desire for revenge. It ravages the soul, eats away at a person’s core. And there’s always collusion, complicity in a relationship. One party is never solely to blame.’ He added quietly, ‘Sadly, we all have flaws… flaws which we carry with us all of our lives.’
‘Yes, and we have our frailties as well. And to be imperfect is to be human. I was thinking about you last night, asking myself if you had really forgiven me, truly, deep in your heart, or whether you just said you had…’ Her voice faded away.
‘Have you ever known me to say anything I don’t mean?’
They were not looking at the paintings now. They were looking at each other. As he stared down into the pale and delicate face upturned to his, he saw that it had hardly been touched by time at all. Yet it had changed. An ethereal quality reposed there, and a serenity. And the eyes held a clarity and a deep wisdom that was wholly new. They really are turquoise, he thought, neither green nor blue, but a curious mingling of those shades. They were dazzling. And to his utter amazement he felt a familiar stirring in his blood, and then that same old breathlessness, a sense of expectation, of anticipation clutched at him. His gaze lingered on her.
For her part, she was noting the finely-drawn lines around the eyes and in the lean and clever face, detected the tiredness in those bright cornflower depths. The puckish irreverent mouth had a sterner curve to it, and the blond hair was speckled with grey. The boyishness had fled, had been replaced by a certain austerity, and there was authority in his face, though there was nothing unyielding about him, she could tell that. And despite the differences the years had wrought, he did not look fifty-one years old.
Katharine’s gaze was as unwavering as Nick’s. She continued to scrutinize him, endeavouring to understand his attitude towards her, and unexpectedly she felt a warmth pervading her and her heart reached out to him.
He did not miss the imperceptible flicker in her shining eyes, nor did the plea on her face escape his notice. Instinctive knowledge of her, his old understanding of her psyche, filled his heart to overflowing, and he stepped forward, took her hand in his, was vaguely conscious of its iciness.
‘You need to hear me say it again, don’t you, Kath?’ he murmured, using the diminutive for the first time. She nodded.
‘I forgive you, I truly do, and from the bottom of my heart.’
‘Thank you, Nicky.’
As if spellbound, they stood in the centre of the room, isolated by their varied emotions, oblivious to the people now drifting around them. It was only a brief moment; it seemed like eternity to Katharine. He released her hand, drew her with him to the door. ‘Let’s get out of here,’ he said, and they left the Frick without exchanging a word.
He guided her down Fifth Avenue, still without speaking, and they walked seven blocks in total silence. Abruptly Nick stopped, looked down at her and grinned. ‘Where are we going?’
‘I don’t know. I thought you did!’
They were standing on the corner of Sixty-Third and Fifth. He glanced ahead, saw the green-tinted tower of the Plaza Hotel in the distance. ‘You always used to like tea at that little hole-in-the-wall yonder,’ he joked. ‘Shall we?’
‘Of course, Nicky.’
He questioned himself why he was doing this as they ambled towards Fifty-Ninth Street. It was asking for trouble, wasn’t it? And he had enough troubles to contend with at the moment. His personal life was already one unholy mess, without Katharine Tempest in the wings, cued to take her one-man audience by storm. On the other hand, like Francesca, he felt there was unfinished business between Katharine and himself. He had so many questions, the answers to which had eluded him for years. Only she could supply them. And something about her had touched him in the Frick, had moved him even. When he and Frankie had left her at the Carlyle on Monday afternoon, they had both commented on Katharine’s apparent rationality, her unusual calmness. Was she stable? And if so, why? What happened to her to bring about the changes? He had a compulsion to unearth the reasons if he could, and in so doing perhaps find some answers about himself.
Within a few minutes they were pushing through the revolving doors of the hotel, and being shown to a table in a corner of the Palm Court. Nick helped her off with her black mink coat, threw his trenchcoat on top of it in the vacant chair. ‘Listen, I’ve got to make a ’phone call. To Nanny,’ he explained. ‘I told her I’d only be gone for an hour, that I’d be back to take the boy for his afternoon walk. I’ve got a son, you kn—’
‘Yes, I do,’ she interjected. ‘Estelle told me. But I feel awful, depriving him of you. Please, let’s go. We can have tea another day.’ She started to rise.
He pressed her back into the chair, shook his head adamantly. ‘No, it’s all right. Sit down, and order me a vodka martini. I don’t usually drink at this hour, but what the hell.’ He smiled at her, and the puckish quality she thought had vanished for ever leapt out at her. ‘Do you want a glass of wine or a glass of champagne?’ Nick asked, searching his pockets for a dime.
‘No, thanks. You know I’ve never been a big drinker. I’ll order tea.’
‘Okay. Back in a minute,’ he said brightly, swinging away from the table, and there was a jaunty spring to his walk as he hurried out. He looks better than he did on Monday, she thought, and frowned, trying to pinpoint this change. It struck her he was suddenly exuding the infectious gaiety which had been so appealing in the Nick she had once known and loved. Did she still love him? Do not think of such things, she cautioned herself. You cannot revive the old feelings, the old yearnings. It is too late.
The waiter came and she ordered and took out a packet of cigarettes, lit one, sat back, waiting for Nick to return. She peeked at her watch. It was just turning three-thirty. She had plenty of time before her date with Michael Lazarus.
In no time at all Nick was back. ‘I promised him two bedtime stories tonight. I believe it’s called bribery.’
‘Oh Nicky, really, I do think you—’
‘Hey, be quiet, lady. Now, what else did Estelle tell you about my private life? She’s bound to have exaggerated, added a few colourful details to introduce a bit of spice. Very imaginative, our Estelle.’
‘I know Frankie never liked her, and Estelle is a strange person, but she’s been very loyal to me, Nicky,’ Katharine said, sounding softly reproving.
‘Yes, you’re right to defend her. She’s okay. I was only kidding.’
Katharine smiled, half shrugged. ‘Anyway, she didn’t tell me very much, merely mentioned your son, said you live with a Venezuelan beauty. Your public life I know all about… your books and your screenplays, I mean.’ She tapped her cigarette in the ashtray, leaned across the table, her smile widening, ‘What’s your little boy’s name?’
‘Victor.’
‘Oh.’ She pulled back, said quickly, ‘I tried to speak to his namesake when I was staying at the Bel-Air Hotel, but his housekeeper said he was in Mexico.’
Nick eyed her speculatively, his face sobering. ‘Do you also want to explain everything to Vic?’
‘Yes. I think I owe it to him.’
‘He won’t be back for another week, Kath.’
‘Then I shall call him then. Would that be all right, do you think?’
‘Sure. Oh good, here’s your tea and my martini.’
A quietness fell between them. Katharine poured tea, added lemon and sugar; Nick stirred his martini, lit a cigarette. Finally he raised his glass to her. ‘Down the
hatch,’ he said.
She lifted her cup, repeated the toast.
‘You always did look good in blue, Kath,’ said Nick, his eyes roaming over her appreciatively.
‘Thank you, so did you,’ she quipped, focusing on his pale blue Turnbull and Asser shirt, darker blue tie, navy-blue cashmere blazer.
‘We do it to play up our eyes, don’t you know?’
Merriment spilled out of Katharine. ‘I’ll never forget going to a party in London a couple of years ago, and hearing one guest tell another that I always wore sapphires because they matched my eyes, but that all my blue gems were actually artificial. And the second old biddy said, “Oh really, my deah, how extraordinary. And are her eyes artificial too?” Katharine mimicked in an exaggerated English accent. ‘It made my day, Nicky.’
He said, ‘There’s never been anything artificial about your beauty, my darl—’ He cut himself off abruptly.
Katharine looked away, and when she turned back to him she said, ‘Could I ask you a question, Nick?’
‘I’ll trade you one for two.’
‘It’s a deal. I’ve been wondering for years why you never ever told me about Victor and Frankie.’
‘Very simple. She made me promise not to say a word to anyone, including you.’
‘I see.’
‘My first question is: What have you been doing all this time? While you’ve lived in London. You’ve certainly not made any pictures.’
Without hesitation, she said, ‘Getting my head straight. I’ve had almost nine solid years of deep psychiatric care and treatment for schizophrenia. Dr Edward Moss, who’s been likened to R. D. Laing, pronounced me cured over a year ago, and I’m really quite proud of myself.’
Nick was silent, chilled to the bone at the thought of what she had been through. Eventually he said, ‘It must have been sheer hell, but I’m glad you took care of your problems, Kath.’ He was reflective momentarily, then added, ‘I’ve never seen you quite like this. So serene.’
‘Yes, I do feel good. You have a second question?’
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