The Flower Garden

by Margaret Pemberton

  ‘Number three,’ she said as she took her daiquiri from a silver tray. ‘Is he aware of one, two and four?’

  ‘Being questioned by you is like being questioned by Torquemada.’

  ‘Being questioned by me is child’s play compared to the press,’ Georgina returned complacently. ‘Now, how much does Jack know? More important, what is he going to do about it?’

  ‘He knows that I’m in love with Ramon and he knows that I’m leaving him.’

  ‘Good God! You must be joking!’ For the first time Georgina was genuinely shocked. ‘You’ve been married for seventeen or eighteen years, Nancy. You can’t divorce him for a man like Sanford!’

  ‘I never used the word divorce. I said “leave”.’

  ‘You mean you intend to leave Jack to live with Ramon and when the affaire loses its attraction, return home as a dutiful wife? With no one the wiser? You must be out of your mind. In the kind of world that you and I and Ramon live in every move we make is noted and commented upon.’

  There was no way that Nancy could explain that time itself would solve the problem. She remained silent.

  Georgina asked, awe-struck, ‘Has Sanford asked you to marry him?’

  ‘No. As a matter of fact, he hasn’t.’

  Georgina slammed a clenched fist against her smooth brow in complete mystification. ‘You’ve taken leave of your senses! What will you have when Ramon leaves you? What will happen to you? What will your future be?’

  Nancy could have told her, but she didn’t. She was beginning to feel the old fear rising; the fear of the dark and the unknown. Only with Ramon did she feel truly safe.

  ‘Is Nicki aware that you are openly associating with Ramon and acting as hostess for him?’

  ‘No. Not yet.’

  ‘Is Vere?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Is Jack aware that you have had a fleeting affaire with Nicki or that Vere is in love with you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘My God.’ Georgina leaned back exhausted against her cushions. ‘I don’t envy you your explanations. Thank goodness I had the sense to marry a nice, uncomplicated man.’

  ‘Then all this faithful bit isn’t just for old HM’s benefit?’

  ‘Good heavens no!’ Georgina was affronted. ‘If I’d wanted to bolt, all the tea in China wouldn’t have stopped me. I’ll have you know that between the sheets Charles is a mixture of Clark Gable and Valentino. But don’t ever tell him I told you so. He’d think it frightfully un-British.’

  Nancy grinned. She had seen Giovanni descending down the deeply wooded path at the far side of the pool. Behind him a bellboy carried easel, paints and canvas.

  She rose to her feet. ‘Try not to worry too much about me, Georgina. I know what I’m doing.’

  ‘I hope you do. I’m damn sure I don’t,’ and she raised her hand to summon a waiter to refill her glass. At this rate she would be tight before lunch. If she was, it would all be Nancy Cameron’s fault.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Four satisfying hours later Nancy walked up the dusty path beneath the shade of the trees. Even for Ramon she had felt a reluctance to leave her painting. Like yesterday, they had worked together silently. Again he had risen when the bellboy brought his simple lunch and surveyed her work. He had still said nothing – merely nodded. The painting held primitive strength and passion. It was the work of a natural artist. It moved him and it would move others. Nancy Leigh Cameron had put her soul into oil and it showed in every brush stroke.

  As the wilderness of tangled flowers and shrubbery gave way to the immaculate, carefully-tended gardens Nancy changed course, taking the longer way back to the entrance of Ramon’s suite, avoiding the pool and its laughing cliques. She was deep in thought, remembering the few words Giovanni had spoken when they had put down their brushes and he had broken the still-warm crusty bread and bitten deep into the hunk of cheese.

  He was her Father Confessor. The only man who knew the truth about her. Today, life, not death, was what they had talked about: her life with Jack; her love for Ramon; the feeling of guilt and pity that tore at her now that Jack had arrived. Giovanni had listened, making no comments, finishing his peasant lunch and drinking his wine. When she had risen to leave he had said simply:

  ‘Never insult the person you have loved by offering duty or pity.’

  She began to cross the velvet-smooth lawns that were barred to the public. She had been pitying Jack and Giovanni was right. In doing so, she had been insulting him. No more pity and no more loveless duty.

  As to her painting, her mentor had said only, ‘Continue as you have begun. Always paint your interior world; the world of the mind, of dreams and nightmares, of unbridled imagination. That is where your talent lies, not in the world we see, copying landscapes or figures or jugs and fruit. Leave that to others. Your talent is of a different kind.’

  ‘Am I invisible?’ He was laughing down at her, only yards away.

  She blinked and smiled. ‘I was miles away – thinking.’

  ‘You should have been in bed, resting and not painting.’

  Her arm slid around the now-familiar leanness of his waist as his arm circled hers. ‘How do you know I’ve been painting?’

  ‘It was a difficult deduction, but the scarlet streak on your cheek and the smudge of blue on the tip of your nose gave me a clue.’

  Her hands shot to her face, horrified. ‘Is it as bad as all that? I must look like a clown.’

  ‘You look delightful,’ and to prove that she did, he kissed her long and lingeringly.

  When they parted the blue had transferred itself to his darkly handsome face. She laughed and rubbed it away with her fingers.

  ‘I must wash and change.’

  ‘You will do no such thing.’ His voice was firm. ‘I haven’t seen you for sixteen hours and I’m not letting you out of my sight. Besides, I like your feudal warpaint. It makes me feel as if we are in our own private villa and not surrounded by hundreds of irritating guests; as if you have just come in from a morning’s painting and I have been pottering in the garden and preparing lunch.’

  She giggled. ‘I can’t imagine you either pottering in a garden or preparing lunch.’

  His face was mockingly chastising. ‘You have a lot to learn about me, Nancy Leigh O’Shaughnessy.’

  She felt his grip on her waist tighten and was aware that he never called her by her married name of Cameron. ‘There is a side to me that no one, not even I, have seen.’ There was a note of deadly seriousness in his previously laughing voice. ‘But it’s there, sweet love, and about to emerge. Will it bore you? A white-stoned villa in the sun, miles from anywhere and anyone? Groves of oranges and lemons; figs and olives and goats’bells tinkling in the distance?’

  ‘I’m not too sure about the goats,’ she said gravely.

  ‘Perhaps not,’ he conceded. ‘A picturesque touch, but a trifle unsavoury. The peace and quiet and only each other for company from morning to night, and night until morning.’

  ‘It sounds like heaven,’ she said truthfully. There was a sudden trace of sadness in her voice. ‘Can two people be so happy, Ramon? Is it humanly possible?’

  ‘It would appear to be,’ he said and at the expression in his eyes, her heart turned within her breast.

  She had no idea whether heaven existed in the hereafter, and for a woman so close to death, a strange indifference. Her heaven was here. Whatever came after would be either eternal unconsciousness or a very pale copy of what she was now experiencing. There could be no heaven without Ramon.

  They ate on Ramon’s terrace. Vichysoisse and lobster and fat stuffed quails and chaud-froid with truffle designs on them. As they ate they talked, this time not about themselves, but about Sanfords.

  ‘After lunch and after I reluctantly allow you to remove the traces of your morning’s work from your face, we will meet with Senora Henriques. She is housekeeper and will be able to tell you a hundred and one things that I can’t. Also we will go on a Grand
Tour of the hotel. There is a maze of kitchens and pantries and staff quarters. You will need to be familiar with them and know where they are, even if you never visit them personally again.’

  ‘Did Zia?’

  ‘Daily.’

  ‘Then I shall too.’

  He grinned, white teeth flashing in his dark face, his silk shirt casually open at the neck, exposing his strong chest and thickly curling hair. She felt herself colouring at her thoughts, aching with desire for him.

  ‘Sanfords emerged as the grandest of grand hotels back in the early 1870s when the New World discovered the Old and began to do the Grand European Tour. There was the Hotel d’Italie and Bauer on the Grand Canal and in Monte Carlo there was the Grand Hotel Victoria. At Menton there was the Grand Hotel de Venise and in Zurich the Baur au Lac. In Paris there was simply the Grand Hotel, one of the first to introduce music while the guests ate. For the English and Americans who summered at St Moritz, there was the Beau Rivage near Lausanne, where they rested for a few weeks before returning home. And for the truly rich there was Sanfords in Madeira.’ He paused and smiled his devastating smile. ‘There is still Sanfords. Only the clientèle has changed.’

  ‘In what way?’

  Strawberries, ices and fresh-picked peaches were placed on the table. ‘It is now not enough to be simply rich to stay at Sanfords. Zia has turned it into a very prestigious and exclusive club. Every application for a reservation is vetted by her. To gain entry the applicants need to be either a personal friend – in which case blood and money are immaterial – royal or near royal, talented or eccentric. Members of the elegant wolfpack who ski in St Moritz. Sanfords has become the epitome of the world of the Cole Porters, the Astors, the Barbara Huttons and Pola Negris, the glamorous and the beautiful. In the last twenty years Zia has turned Sanfords into a cult. Its fame rests on the virtual impossibility of admittance. Zia chooses the guests as she would for a dinner party. A tight-knit élite of people who will rub sparks off each other, antagonize and entertain. Hence such diverse personalities as the grand duchess and Marisa, the Lothermeres and Costas and Sonny Zakar. It is no accident that the guests are so different, it is careful management.

  ‘And you expect me to do that?’ Nancy asked, aghast.

  ‘Yes. Why not?’

  ‘Because I don’t know these people. I’m American. I’ve only spent a few weeks of each year in Europe and then only in Paris for the Collections.’

  He slipped a piece of Sanford-embossed paper on to the table. On it was a neatly typed list.

  Request for rooms at the moment:

  Mr & Mrs Merriman, Michigan.

  Ramon looked at the notes Villiers had made opposite the names.

  Mr Merriman has made his millions on the fame of his corned beef.

  Nina Correlli; the mezzo soprano, who has taken the

  operatic world by storm with her interpretation of

  Salome.

  Prince Felix Zaronski of the House of Romanov.

  ‘Villiers’notes say the prince travels everywhere with a snow-white stallion and its berth aboard ship is even more luxurious than its master’s.’

  Lady Claire McLean: no sense of humour and even

  less style.

  Polly Watertight.

  ‘Who?’ Nancy nearly choked on her ice cream.

  ‘It’s her real name and she won’t change it. She’s eighty if she’s a day. She comes from Boston North End and is given to doing high kicks after her second glass of champagne.’

  The Duke and Duchess of Corrington: ardent Christian

  Scientists.

  Mr Percy Harvard-Jones.

  ‘How Villiers comes by such knowledge, I have no idea, but the word “celibate” is written large.’

  Kate Murphy.

  ‘She’s the ex-wife of an English duke whose name she long ago abandoned, also ex-wife of an American steel magnate whose alimony she still clings to, ex-wife of a Russian with the dubious title of “Prince”, but neither the Vasileyevs nor Szaparys have ever heard of him and the only time I ever met him I detected a decidedly Western twang to his accent: ex-wife of a twenty-year-old Californian lifeguard.

  ‘I should mention that Kate is a decade older than Zia, and ex-wife of Desmond Murphy, described simply as an Irish entrepreneur. She is addicted to wigs of startling and various colours and these are apt to come adrift when she swims in the pool. This does not disconcert her. She simply finishes the length and retrieves her headgear on her return journey.’

  The prime minister of a country that I would have

  thought needed his presence.

  A Papal legate.

  Mrs Honey-Smith of Wyoming (who has been applying for entrance for over a decade).

  ‘Villiers does not trouble me with the hordes of wealthy businessmen and their wives who also apply. Now, who of those mentioned would you admit?’

  ‘Nina Correlli,’ Nancy said, without hesitation. ‘She might even sing if asked nicely. I think Prince Felix’s white stallion would look quite pretty pawing the ground, surrounded by doves and peacocks. Definitely Polly Watertight and Kate Murphy and I do feel for Mrs Honey-Smith. Such persistence should be allowed to pay off.’

  ‘Ten out of ten,’ Ramon said complacently. ‘They are exactly the names that Zia marked.’

  ‘Then if you knew who was to be admitted, why ask me?’ Nancy said indignantly as the table was deftly cleared, only the chilled wine and half-full glasses remaining.

  ‘Just testing you,’ he said wickedly, and was rewarded by a sharp kick on his ankle.

  His retaliation was to move so fast that Nancy had no time to even push her chair away from the table. His arms were around her, crushingly tight.

  ‘For that you will pay a forfeit.’

  The waiter emerged with the liqueur trolly and quietly withdrew.

  Some while later a braver Villiers coughed discreetly and announced that Senora Henriques was ready and waiting for her appointment with Mrs Cameron.

  ‘Damn,’ Ramon said, and released her. ‘You’ll have to go. She’s a busy lady and I don’t want to disrupt her timetable.’

  ‘Aren’t you coming with me?’

  He shook his head. ‘Linen cupboards and still-rooms hold no charms for me, my love. I’ll see you later, for pre-dinner cocktails with the privileged few.’

  Senora Henriques was a pleasant-faced, elegantly-dressed woman of indeterminate years. Her gleaming black hair was brushed smoothly into a glossy chignon at the nape of her neck. Her pale grey dress bore traces of Paris; her hands bore merely a simple gold band and her nails were perfectly manicured. She wore pearl earrings and silk stockings, and escorted Nancy without displaying anything as vulgar as curiosity.

  In the next two hours Nancy learned so much about the organization behind the scenes at Sanfords that her head reeled.

  The crèpe de chine sheets and pillow cases were changed twice a day. Sanfords’guests were accustomed to taking afternoon naps. They could not be expected to return to sheets already slept in. Personal initials were embroidered on all linen, even if the guest was staying for only a few days. For royals and ex-royals, a crown was also lavishly embroidered above the monogram.

  The personal maids of several guests had their own maids. Nancy was shown the quarters for guests’staff and for hotel staff. She met the man whose only job was to polish and re-polish the vast acres of the ballroom floor and she noticed, now that the ballroom was temporarily empty, that the glittering crystal chandeliers gave a slight tinkling sound as the air moved them.

  She met numerous chefs, pantry boys, butlers and under-butlers. House maids, laundry maids, footmen, bellboys and gardeners. In the still-room she watched as bread and cakes were adeptly prepared by the hundred. She gazed in wonder at the amount of laundry done daily on the premises. She was informed that all soaps were specially imported from France; that there was a different table decoration every night for a month; that red carpet was always rolled from Sanfords’marble-floored hall
to the doors of arriving motor cars, so that no feet should be sullied on the short journey from car to hotel. Savonnerie carpets graced the unlikeliest rooms. The tea caddies were solid silver and George III. Beds ranged from vast modern creations tented in chiffon like her own, to Hepplewhite mahogany four-posters with fluted posts and lavish carvings of flowers and lilies.

  In the writing room the bureaux ranged from a French bureau de dame of Louis XV to an eighteenth century Dutch marquetry bookcase. The ink stands were silver and George IV. The minutest details of guests’ whims and foibles were carefully indexed, the files resting in Senora Henriques’ spacious private room with a rosewood desk inlaid with satinwood and dull gold leather surface. A duplicate file was in Villiers’possession.

  Sanfords, she learned, employed its own hair stylists, beauticians and masseurs. There was a team of seamstresses under the guidance of a tiny, bird-like woman who created all Zia’s personal clothes. For fancy dress balls and masques they worked day and night preparing lavish costumes that would be worn only once.

  She was informed that the grand duchess was accompanied by an equerry with the rank of baron; that European nobility habitually travelled with a ‘man of affairs’; that several rooms, whose beds were changed twice a day were never occupied; that these were the rooms that Senora Henriques termed delicately as those of ‘travelling companions’. For example, Lady Bessbrook’s Venetian-style suit of rooms was adjoining those of Mr Luke Golding – a more austere single suite. Mr Golding’s rooms were never used and his clothes hung in Lady Bessbrook’s wardrobes. Nevertheless, the ritual of behaving as if Mr Golding did occupy his suite was scrupulously adhered to. It occurred to Nancy that this quiet, efficient woman at her side probably knew more about the sexual indiscretions of the International Set than anyone else alive. That none of that set were even aware of her existence only made the supposition more fascinating.

  Charmingly, Senora Henriques put herself at Nancy’s disposal. Sanfords’ wheels ran smoothly and would continue to do so. However, if Mrs Cameron wanted anything changed …