Breath of Corruption

by Caro Fraser

  Georgia gazed after her, feeling a mixture of admiring awe at Anthea’s careless, gazelle-like beauty as she sauntered to the kitchen, and an incipient sense of guilty horror at the thought of the despoiled cake. Lucy and Georgia exchanged glances.

  Anthea’s voice came screeching from the kitchen. ‘Lucy, you prize little cow! What have you done to my cake?’ She raged back into the room, blonde hair flying loose, eyes blazing. ‘I could bloody murder you! I picked that up especially from Patisserie Valerie at lunchtime! It was for Chantal’s birthday tonight! My God, how could the pair of you do that? This is the absolute bloody limit, Lucy! This is the last, last time you set foot in my flat – ever! Give me my key now!’ She held out her hand. ‘Come on!’ Sulkily Lucy dug in her coat pocket for the key and flung it at Anthea, who went on, ‘You are such an immature little bitch – d’you know that, Lucy? When are you going to grow up and stop your pathetic behaviour? My God, you’re nearly eighteen, but how can anyone take you seriously when you behave like this? You’re like a spoilt thirteen-year-old!’

  ‘That’s not what Leo thinks,’ retorted Lucy. She was angry, humiliated, and a little drunk. Georgia huddled nervously on the sofa, not sure whether she was enjoying the developing row or not.

  ‘Oh, you are joking, aren’t you?’ laughed Anthea. ‘The way you come on to him – my God! It’s a total embarrassment! If you have to get a crush on someone, choose someone your own age. We both feel sorry for you.’

  ‘Really? Then how come he slept with me while you were in Bermuda?’

  Anthea laughed again, but with less certainty. ‘Please, keep your adolescent fantasising to yourself! Leo wouldn’t look at you.’

  ‘He’s done a lot more than that. D’you want to know what happened? We spent Friday night at his place, in his bed. He told me he’d always wanted to go to bed with a seventeen-year-old.’

  Anthea’s face was stricken with disbelief. ‘You little bitch! What is it with you and your lies?’

  ‘It’s not lies! Your lovely Leo’s been coming on to me ever since we first met here, in your flat, only you were too up your own arse to notice! He likes young girls, the younger the better he told me. He told me it while he was making love to me—’

  Anthea fetched her sister a hefty slap across the face, so hard that it sent Lucy stumbling backwards into a chair. Georgia looked on in thrilled horror. ‘Don’t you dare, Lucy!’ hissed Anthea. ‘I’m warning you!’

  Lucy put her hand to the red mark glowing on her cheek, and smiled shakily. ‘You just can’t stand to hear the truth, can you? Well, ask him! Ask him if I didn’t spend the night with him! Then we’ll see who’s lying. I was there all Friday night, in his house, in his bed, and in the morning he drove me home. I told Mum I was at Georgia’s.’ She turned to Georgia. ‘Georgia knew what was going on. Didn’t you?’

  Georgia nodded weakly.

  ‘You’re lying, I know you are!’ But Anthea was now far from certain. Lucy could see it in her eyes.

  ‘He made love to me, Anthea! It happened! Why would I make it up?’

  ‘God, why do you ever do anything?’ She reached down and grabbed Lucy by her shoulders, dragging her to her feet. ‘Tell me – look me in the eyes and tell me you’re not lying, you little cow!’

  ‘I’m not! Your precious Leo took me to bed! You want proof? I even know what kind of sheets and pillowcases he has – blue ones, with little white squares round the edges. Now do you believe me? How would I know that if I hadn’t been in his bed?’

  ‘Why?’ There were angry tears in Anthea’s eyes. ‘Why would you do something like that, Lucy?’

  ‘I did it because I wanted to, and so did he! Deal with it!’ Lucy grabbed her shoes and put them on, picked up her belongings and stormed out, with Georgia not far behind her.

  As they went downstairs, Georgia gasped, ‘My God, Luce! That was such a total lie! You told me that when you got back to his place you decided you didn’t fancy him after all, and that nothing happened!’

  ‘Yeah, well – she deserves it, telling me off like I’m a kid. I mean, how humiliating was that? God, she’s so up herself! Let her believe it. I don’t care.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Oblivious of all that was happening in Fulham, Leo spent the evening with Michael and Anthony, discussing events in chambers. They agreed that a chambers’ meeting should be held, but Leo decided he would speak personally to Maurice beforehand. The next day he went to see him, taking with him the copy of Melanie’s reference.

  ‘I take it you know by now that it was Roger who downloaded the documents from your computer and sent them round the building?’ said Leo. ‘It was an inexcusable thing to do, of course, and he’ll be making an apology to you. However, it seems he was concerned about this.’ Leo laid the piece of paper on Maurice’s desk.

  Maurice didn’t even glance at it. ‘I don’t care what concerns he had, he had no business—’

  ‘Well, hold on,’ interrupted Leo. ‘There’s more to this issue than Roger’s invasion of your privacy, unwarranted though it was. We can’t just ignore what he turned up. This reference, for a start.’

  Maurice picked up the paper, and his face grew uneasy. ‘This is privileged.’

  ‘No, it isn’t. You’re a lawyer. You know you can’t write whatever you like about someone – not if a prospective employer is going to read it. It can be construed as defamation. And why the hell would you want to say any of this about Melanie? She was excellent, as you well know.’ Maurice shrugged, evidently discomfited. ‘Now, I suggest you withdraw this, and write something halfway decent, or I will. You’re jeopardising her employment chances.’

  ‘I can amend it, I suppose.’

  ‘Do that. I want to see it when it’s done. Now’ – Leo sat down – ‘we come to the more important matter of the fee notes which Roger disclosed. I wanted to speak to you about these first, to save you unnecessary embarrassment at the chambers’ meeting. It appears on the face of it that you’ve been billing clients direct. I wondered if you had anything to say about it?’

  ‘I’ve done nothing improper, if that’s what you mean. Some of it relates to offshore work which came through an acquaintance of mine – a lawyer, admittedly, but since solicitors weren’t involved there was no referral aspect—’

  ‘You know that doesn’t matter. All work which comes to you should go through the system.’

  ‘—and the vast majority relate to work done for an Italian company, in which I happen to be a forty per cent shareholder. Those invoices were merely raised for accounting purposes, and to identify the work done. My payment comes in the form of share options.’

  ‘I take it you’ve been spending a good deal of time doing work for this Italian company?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘Which I suppose would account for your billing figures being down. The company’s called Perinetti, isn’t it?’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘And your wife’s maiden name, as I recall, is Perini.’

  ‘What a lot you know.’

  ‘The point is, Maurice, there are some members of chambers who would say – and I might put myself among them – that since you’ve been using chambers’ facilities to spend your time doing work for a family company, you should pay for the privilege. You’ve been avoiding paying your fair whack. You know perfectly well that all work has to go through the clerks. I have to tell you they’re not very happy.’

  ‘When are they ever?’

  ‘You’re pocketing their commission. You’re bypassing the system. Added to which, behaviour like this could get us into trouble with the Bar Council and the Inland Revenue. Not something the other members of chambers will be too pleased about.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with them. This is private work, so it’s a private matter.’

  ‘Not if it raises problems for chambers.’

  Maurice threw Leo a cynical look. ‘You see this as an ideal opportunity to stir up resentment against me, don�
��t you? I still maintain I’ve done nothing wrong.’

  Leo rose. ‘That’s for the meeting to decide. I’m calling it for five thirty on Friday. You can put your side of things then.’

  Leo left Maurice’s room without another word.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Leo had arranged with Rachel that he would pick Oliver up from school that afternoon. He worked through lunchtime to make sure he could leave at two fifteen, giving him forty five minutes to reach Chiswick, which he assumed would be ample time mid-afternoon. He was unprepared, however, for the swarms of traffic produced by the daily school run, and it took him longer than he had anticipated to negotiate the Land Rovers and double-parked people carriers which choked the side roads near to Oliver’s school.

  By the time he had managed to park the car and get to the school, it was three fifteen, and Oliver was inside, waiting with the teacher on duty. Leo apologised for being late, gave Oliver a hug, and was just about to leave with him when the deputy headmistress, whom he recognised from Oliver’s first day, came out of her office, waving an envelope.

  ‘Mr Davies, a gentleman left this for Mrs Davies earlier today. I was going to give it to her first thing tomorrow morning, but since you’re here, perhaps you can give it to her.’

  Leo took the envelope. ‘A gentleman? What did he look like?’

  ‘Well, let’s see. He was a very tall man, foreign I’d say, with dark hair, and what you’d call designer stubble.’ She enunciated these last words with delicate irony, intending to convey to Leo that he hadn’t really been what she would classify as a ‘gentleman’ at all.

  ‘Right,’ said Leo. ‘Thank you.’

  He hurried Oliver to the car, then got in and opened the envelope. It was an unpleasant letter, conveying non-specific threats aimed at both Rachel and Oliver. Had Rachel read it, she would have been frightened and distressed, but she would have had no way of connecting it to Leo or his work. Nor would the police. It was, Leo realised, a warning intended directly for him, from the man who had come to see him.

  Leo swore under his breath. So much for protecting his position in relation to the Proceeds of Crime Act. This was what came of indicating to Sir Dudley that he knew what was going on. He’d just made things worse.

  ‘Daddy, you said the S word,’ said Oliver reprovingly.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Leo. ‘That was bad. Come on, let’s get you home and give you some tea. Then we can play, and I’ll take you back to Mummy’s before bedtime.’

  He stuffed the letter, which he had no intention of disclosing to Rachel, into his coat pocket, thanking providence that it was he, and not the childminder, who had picked Oliver up today.

  Pride, and the suspicion that Lucy might have been telling the truth, prevented Anthea from confronting Leo. Instead she took her unhappiness off to Lola, who, from her elegant penthouse overlooking the river, offered the usual comforts of champagne and a little coke.

  ‘I couldn’t very well turn up at Chantal’s party without the cake, so I had to go hunting round for another.’

  ‘Did you find one?’ asked Lolly, deftly cutting thin, snowy lines of cocaine on the small glass plate in front of her. Just enough for a little evening ‘sniffter’, as she called it. She was very fond of that joke.

  ‘Eventually, in a patisserie in Pimlico, but it wasn’t spectacular. I’d ordered the other one specially. And those moronic teenagers ate half of it! I could absolutely have killed them both.’

  ‘What happened to the other half?’ asked Lolly wistfully. ‘Did you eat it?’

  ‘Darling, as if I would, with you in the world.’ She delved into a carrier bag and brought out the cake box.

  ‘How fab. We’ll have it in a minute. Here – you do that, while I get us some champers.’

  She proffered the little mirror to Anthea, who snorted her couple of lines as daintily as it was possible to do, then shook back her blonde hair and sighed. ‘I don’t usually do this stuff, you know. But right now I need it. I still haven’t told you the worst bit.’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘Oh, Lolly!’

  ‘What?’ asked Lola in alarm, setting down the glasses and the bottle. She put her arms round her friend and let her weep for a little while, before disengaging herself to pop the champagne and pour it out. ‘Here, get this down you’ – she handed Anthea a glass – ‘and tell me what’s wrong.’

  Anthea dabbed her tears. ‘That little cow of a sister of mine tells me she slept with Leo while I was away.’

  ‘Oh, crap!’

  ‘What?’ Anthea eyed her friend doubtfully. ‘You mean – crap, as in rubbish, or crap, as in, oh no?’

  ‘The first. He wouldn’t do something like that.’

  ‘He might. She would.’

  ‘Would she?’

  Anthea knocked back her champagne and gave a miserable, impatient sniff. ‘She’s had a crush on him for a while. She’s always finding excuses to be there when he comes round.’

  ‘So what? That tells you nothing. Oh for God’s sake, Leo wouldn’t sleep with your sister! She’s only seventeen.’

  ‘She said he said he liked younger girls. And look at her, Lolly – she can be quite the sex kitten when she wants to. Bitch,’ she murmured, and took another swig of champagne. ‘I seriously believe it might have happened, Lolly. Her putrid friend Georgia backed her up.’

  ‘Like she would know.’

  ‘She seemed to. If it happened, she was in on it somehow. My God, Lucy even described his bloody bed linen to me! How could she do that if she wasn’t there?’ Anthea put her face in her hands.

  There was a brief silence as Lola considered the possibilities. ‘Don’t you trust him?’ she asked at length.

  ‘Oh my God, Lolly!’ wailed Anthea. ‘What are you talking about? Of course I don’t trust him!’ She beat her fists against the sofa cushions in frustration. ‘I don’t want him to be that kind of man – it’s so boring! I just don’t want him sleeping with my little sister! Half-sister,’ she added. ‘Her father’s to blame for how awful she is.’

  ‘What makes you think she’s really slept with him? She’s probably just winding you up because you were upset about the cake. Shall we have some, by the way?’

  ‘Lolly, she said she stayed at his house on Friday night. She said he made love to her and drove her home the next morning. Now, either he did – or he didn’t.’

  Lola shrugged. ‘You may not trust him, but the least you can do is ask him. Shall we have that cake now?’

  Anthea threw herself back against the cushions and groaned. ‘How abject is that going to sound? I mean, imagine asking him if he slept with Lucy! My God …’

  ‘Well, you don’t have to be that direct.’ Lola tenderly lifted the lid of the cake box. ‘Say she told you some stuff about staying over at his house, and take it from there.’

  ‘I could, I suppose.’ She blew her nose and looked at Lola. ‘He wouldn’t, would he? I mean, what kind of man would sleep with their girlfriend’s teenage sister?’

  Lola decided it was best to leave this unanswered. ‘I’ll get a knife for the cake,’ she said.

  When they had finished cake, coke and champagne, Lola said, ‘I’m sorry you can’t stay longer, sweetie, but I have to go out in fifteen minutes.’

  ‘That’s OK, Lolly,’ said Anthea, putting on her shoes. ‘I’m going to go home and have a bath. And work out what to do.’

  ‘You’ve probably got nothing to worry about. You know what teenage girls are like – it’s probably all in her mind.’

  ‘Well, if I find out it’s not, I’m not sure who I’ll kill first – her or him.’

  When she got home Anthea decided there was no way that she was going to ring Leo. The idea of calling him and demanding to know whether he’d slept with Lucy was too debasing. She ran a bath and lay in it, soaking and thinking. If anything had happened between Leo and Lucy, that was the end. What she’d said to Lola was true – there was a certain piquancy to the knowledge that Leo might not be the most trustwort
hy lover in the world, but there were limits. But why would he do such a thing? She’d really thought Leo was beginning to value what they had together, that their mutual pretence at its inconsequentiality masked something deeper. Maybe she was kidding herself. A sick, cold feeling of certainty began to take hold of her. Of course it was true. How could it not be? Lucy wouldn’t know what kind of sheets he had on his bed if she hadn’t slept in them. She wouldn’t make up a story like that without some evidence to back it up. An image of Leo and Lucy together presented itself; Anthea gave a little whimper and sank down beneath the water to obliterate it. After a few seconds of immersion she thought she heard the phone. She emerged with a gasp and splutter, and listened. Definitely the phone.

  With a sigh she launched her lovely body out of the bath, pulled on a towelling robe, and padded to her room, wringing her wet hair with her hands. She lifted the receiver. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Anthea, it’s Leo.’ Her heart gave a little dip. ‘I was wondering if you’d like some company this evening.’

  Anthea sat down on the bed. The sound of his voice brought it all together for her – so cool and arrogant, full of the easy assumption that he’d got away with it. You snake, Leo, she thought. Coming on like you can do that to me and I won’t find out. Her voice was cold as she replied, ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘No? Why’s that? You sound fed up.’

  ‘I imagine you’d probably prefer something younger. Something in the sixteen-, seventeen-year-old range, perhaps?’

  There was a pause, then Leo suddenly realised where this was coming from. He sighed and said, ‘What has Lucy been saying?’ And as soon as the words were uttered, he wished them back.

  ‘My God, I didn’t think you’d admit it that easily,’ said Anthea, trying to keep her voice steady. ‘But then, why wouldn’t you? You can hardly deny it, not in the circumstances. Not now that she’s told me all about it.’