by Janet Tanner
‘I share his bed when he asks me. What do you expect? It doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t!’
Brit swore and let her go.
‘Brit, please …’ she begged.
He stood up, crossing to the bureau for his cigarettes with long, impatient strides.
‘I can’t bear to think of him touching you. He doesn’t know about me yet, remember, but by Christ, I know about him! For God’s sake, leave him, Elise!’
There was a momentary silence, then she sobbed softly. ‘You don’t know what you’re asking, Brit. It’s not that simple.’
‘It is quite simple.’
‘It’s not just a question of me and Gordon. There’s Alex to consider, too. Oh, can I have a cigarette, please?’ He gave her one and lit it for her, a brash movement with the anger barely concealed. She blew out the smoke on a trembling breath and continued, ‘ He’s only five years old, Brit. What would it do to him?’
‘He would get over it.’
‘Would he? I don’t know. He idolises Gordon. I don’t want to harm him, Brit; I don’t want him to grow up feeling bitter, perhaps even thinking it’s his fault that things didn’t work out between his father and mother. Children do think that sometimes, don’t they?’
‘I wouldn’t know. Child psychology’s not my line.’
‘Don’t be flippant!’ she snapped, close to tears. ‘He’s suffering already because I don’t spend enough time with him. I should know, after all. I am his mother.’
They glared at one another, then suddenly he stubbed out his cigarette and reached for her. ‘Come here.’
‘Brit.’
‘Come here, I said!’
As his arms went round her she collapsed against him, her face pressed into his shoulder. Gently he massaged her back and the tension began to ease out of her in shuddering spasms. His lips were in her hair, whispering, soothing until gradually she began to respond. She clung to him as he led her through to the bedroom, and for a little while she forgot everything in the rapturous union of their bodies.
Afterwards, however, the turmoil soon returned. Making love was probably like taking drugs, she thought: blissful oblivion for just a little while, disguising problems but not curing them.
‘Oh Brit, what are we going to do?’ she asked softly.
He raised himself up on one elbow to look down at her and stroked her hair away from her forehead, loving the clear lines of her face and the thick fringe of lashes that protected her amber eyes; stirred to tenderness by the vulnerability of her mouth, stubborn though it could sometimes be, and the small, straight nose which helped to give her face its character.
‘There are a number of things we ought to talk about which we haven’t discussed,’ he said gravely. ‘One thing we seem to have ignored these last few days is that there is a war going on. Have you said anything yet to Gordon about taking Alex and getting out of Hong Kong?’
‘Not really,’ she admitted. ‘I have mentioned it once or twice, but you’ve heard what the reaction is. He simply refuses to accept that there is any danger.’
‘It was the main reason you wanted to get back,’ he reminded her. ‘To take Alex to a place of safety.’
Elise said nothing. It was all very well to pretend she had not pressed the point with Gordon because she had thought he would be certain to refuse. That was only pan of the truth. The rest had to do with her reluctance to leave Brit – to cut herself off from him completely, perhaps. And strangely, here in Hong Kong the general apathy had affected her. What had seemed urgent and inevitable in Cairo and throughout their journey now appeared like a bogeyman conjured up to frighten children. Hong Kong might have to endure the occasional blackout, Hugh de Gama and the others might be playing at soldiers in the Volunteer Defence Corps; but on the whole, life was exactly as it had always been.
‘Do you really believe evacuation is necessary?’ she asked.
‘Yes, you know I do.’ There was a hard edge to his voice. ‘The war is coming to Hong Kong, there is no doubt about that. The bigger companies have already accepted that it’s inevitable – you heard what Hugh de Gama said. Even the owners of the Peninsula Hotel chain are refusing to make any further investment at the moment, and my father is putting up the blinds in his companies as far as is possible. It’s only the smaller businessmen and the ordinary people who refuse to face facts.’
A chill ran over her skin. ‘So you still think I should go to Australia?’
‘I know you should.’
‘But you’re still here,’ she said defensively.
‘That’s got nothing to do with it.’ Brit’s fingers traced the line of her jawbone and crept up her chin to outline her mouth. ‘I can take care of myself. Besides,’ he hesitated, ‘I don’t know how much longer I shall be here.’
She swivelled her head sharply, feeling very much as if she had just stepped over the edge of a cliff, and he moved his long frame slightly beneath the midnight blue silk sheets.
‘I have a job to do, Elise. There is no point in your asking me what it is – I can’t tell you. But it is going to take me away from Hong Kong – for how long, I don’t know, but it may be quite a while.’
‘But you’re being invalided out of the RAF, you told me.’
‘That’s true. But it is not quite the whole truth. I’m sorry, Elise. I really cannot tell you any more than that. You will have to accept that there are things which cannot be told when there’s a war on.’
‘You mean – you’re going to do something secret!’ she asked incredulously.
‘I’m working for Intelligence, yes. And if you tell anyone else that, you could get me killed.’
‘Oh my God!’ she said.
She was suddenly very cold, and all the problems of their relationship seemed very unimportant. Brit, working for Intelligence! Brit, a security agent – a spy! She couldn’t believe it; yet even in that first startled moment, she realised that it explained a great many things which had puzzled her up to now. ‘Your leg – your hand – the crash …’ she said foolishly.
‘All true,’ he assured her. ‘The only thing is that I am not completely on the scrap-heap.’
She lay quite still while the shock ran through her in shuddering waves. Then she struggled to sit up.
‘When do you have to go?’
‘Quite soon.’
‘So it’s all immaterial really – Hugh threatening to tell Gordon if I see you again. I won’t be able to see you because you won’t be here.’ Emotion had stirred anger in her as it so often did – the anger of self-defence. ‘No wonder you could afford to be so blasé about it.’
‘Elise … Elise …’ He leaned across, smoothing her hair away from her face. ‘Don’t be so touchy. I love you, remember?’
‘Then why are you going away?’ She knew she was being irrational, but she could not help it. She wanted to strike out at someone and the only one she could vent her frustration on was Brit.
‘I’m going away because I have to,’ he said reasonably. ‘But before I go, I want to make sure you’re safe, not stuck here in this rat-trap. I want you to go to Australia.’
There was a pause while she thought about it.
‘But even if Gordon did agree to my going to Australia, it would all have to be arranged,’ she said at last. ‘ I’ve got nowhere to go.’
Diplomatically he ignored the reference to Gordon.
‘I can solve that problem. Cormorant have holdings in Australia – real estate in Sydney, a sheep farm in Victoria and another in New South Wales. You would be safe there and a great deal more comfortable than some of the evacuees – though mostly they seem to be behaving like spoiled children – bellyaching about the size of their rooms not being what they’re used to, instead of counting themselves lucky to be out of the way of what’s coming here.’
She shivered. ‘But how would I get there?’
‘I would take you. In the Cormorant company plane.’
‘I thought you couldn’t fly.’
/> His mouth twisted, a hard, humorous line. ‘I’ve been exercising my hand whenever I’ve had the opportunity and the use is coming back. And I can always take the Cormorant pilot along with me. As far as the authorities are concerned, he will be responsible for the plane. Only he and I will know that he’s in the co-pilot’s chair.’
Love and tenderness welled up in her as she realised the extent of the determination with which he had faced his injuries.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed, reaching for a black silk robe.
‘I suppose you will say that you must have time to think it over. But for goodness sake, don’t think for too long. I have to go away for a couple of days, starting tomorrow – it’s not the long push and I will be back. But that’s when I will take you, if you want to go. Dammit!’ His voice cracked suddenly and he reached out for her again, pulling her close. ‘Why am I saying it like that – ‘‘if you want to go,’’ as if it made no difference to me either way? Make up your mind, please, Elise. I will take you and Alex to Australia, and I will know where to find you when it’s all over.’
She turned her head, confused by the chaos of her emotions. When she had discovered she wanted him it had been bad enough, but harmless to the extent that it had been an impossible dream. But now the dream was within her grasp. He wanted her, too, and being Brit he intended to do something about it – something which would change all their lives and have far-flung implications from which her mind shrank. She couldn’t just say, ‘ Yes, Brit,’ no matter how much she wanted to do so. There was far more to it than that …
‘I still don’t know if I can leave him,’ she said softly.
‘All right, don’t make up your mind about that now. Just let me get you and Alex to Australia, then you will have time to think, when you are right away from both of us. And when it’s all over I will come for you and take you … Where would you like to go? Back to England? The choice is yours.’
She laughed sadly. ‘ You sound very sure of yourself.’
‘I know that I love you and you love me and that we can have a marvellous life together. Then you will wonder why you ever hesitated.’
‘You think I will stop feeling guilty in time?’
‘Of course you will.’
She sighed. ‘But that’s for the future. What about now? What are we going to do about Hugh?’
His face darkened. ‘I will settle Hugh. Then I have to go away for a couple of days, as I said. But I will be in touch immediately I get back. All right?’
‘All right.’
She wished she could be as sure as he was, seeing things in the same clear-cut black and white. To her there were so many grey areas in between – too many things to be considered, too many people who might be hurt.
Can I take my happiness at the expense of other people? she wondered. Or am I flattering myself anyway? Perhaps Gordon would prefer me to go rather than to stay unwillingly. Is it more of an insult to him to remain out of mere pity?
And what about Hugh? Brit had said he would settle him, whatever that meant. But supposing that proved impossible?
She sighed again, shaking her head at the enormity of it all. But of one thing she was determined: whatever she did, Alex must not suffer. If he did, she would certainly never forgive herself.
And she had two days in which to decide what to do.
Chapter Twenty-One
Through the streets, still sunlit, seeing nothing. Walking as if into a haze.
This is so much more complicated than I ever dreamed it would be, she thought. So many decisions to be made, and all so important – a single step one way or the other would change things irreversibly. I love Brit, I really love him so much; if this were a novel I would just say, ‘The hell with it! I have to be with him whatever it costs.’ But it’s not a story; there are real lives involved – Brit’s, Gordon’s, Alex’s, mine … As for Brit working for Intelligence, I still can’t take that in even now. But it isn’t something you’d invent – it’s true, it must be, but it’s so unbelievable!
She was no nearer coherent thought by the time she reached home, but when she went through the gates and saw Gordon’s car standing in the drive her heart seemed to stop beating.
What was he doing home at this time of day? He never came home in the afternoons.
Alex! she thought in panic. Something must have happened to Alex!
She ran up the steps and into the dim hall. It was full of perfume from the flowers she had bought that morning from a flower seller near the Star Ferry Terminal; as she paused to pat her hair into place and remove any possible lipstick smudges, the scent rose again in a sweet heady wave, making her catch her breath.
‘Gordon – Gordon, where are you?’
‘So you’re back!’
She swung round to see him standing in his study doorway. After the bright sunlight outside she could not see his face too well, there in the shadows, but his voice had sounded strained and it struck terror to her heart once more.
‘Why are you home? What has happened?’
In the brief pause she seemed to live a hundred years. Then he said with heavy deliberation, ‘As if you didn’t know.’
So that was it! All the pieces came together, even that strained ‘So you’re back.’ He knew!
‘Hugh told you,’ she said flatly. There seemed no point in subterfuge any more.
‘Did you really think he would not? Did you imagine everybody is as damnably deceitful as you are?’ When she didn’t answer, he went on, ‘No, you didn’t. You knew that when I saw him the game would be up. That’s why you were asking me about him last night – trying to talk me out of phoning him. My God, when I think how you made up to me to take my mind off phoning him, and I was stupid enough to think you actually meant it!’
‘Gordon, I did mean it!’
‘Don’t insult me with lies, Elise! How long has this been going on? All the time he was ‘‘looking after you’’, I suppose. And maybe even before then? Is that why he got you this passage? No, don’t bother to answer. I don’t want to hear the sordid details.’
‘Give me a chance to speak! I didn’t know him before …’
‘Well, it is quite obvious that as soon as he saw you he knew he was on to a good thing. And he was right, wasn’t he? Six weeks alone with a grateful woman – oh, he knew what he was at! But not satisfied with that, ever since you got back he has been encouraging you to meet him under my nose at the Peninsula. The nerve of it! Did you really think you could get away with it – or didn’t you care?’
‘I did care – I do care …’
‘Then why did you go to see him again this afternoon, after Hugh had given you his ultimatum?’
She was cold and shaking, but her numbed mind was beginning to work again, Lie if you must. Ease the situation somehow.
‘I had to see him. He’s offered to take Alex and me to safety in Australia.’
‘He’s what?’
‘You won’t take the situation seriously, Gordon. I had to turn to someone who does. He promised to arrange …’
‘Oh yes, he’s very good at arranging, isn’t he? Like all the Brittains! Elise, how you could do this to me I cannot imagine. That you should deceive me with anyone is bad enough – but one of those bloody Brittains …’ Gordon rarely swore; when he did, infrequency added impact to the simplest oath.
‘I had to see him, I tell you,’ Elise protested. ‘ I must think of my son’s safety.’
‘And you deny going to bed with him?’ She made no answer and he swore again. ‘You must think me a pretty fool. And the damnable pan of it is that I trusted you completely. Even when you were half-way round the world, I trusted you.’
‘Well, I’m sorry.’ Shame and guilt made her voice sharp, almost hysterical. ‘If I fail to come up to your expectations, I’m very sorry. I am only human, I’m afraid. I have failings like everyone else.’
‘You mean that everyone else behaves in this disgraceful manner and that makes it right?’
‘Oh, don’t be so pious, Gordon! Don’t pretend to be so damned perfect! You were married before you met me and divorced. What went wrong? You never told me. You have always hedged and said that things didn’t work out, that we didn’t want to waste time talking about Olivia, who had made such a mess of your life. But I happen to know there were reasons why it didn’t work out, in the shape – and shape is the word – of your secretary of the time.’
‘Where did you hear this?’ Gordon’s face was a picture of outrage and astonishment and Elise laughed hysterically.
‘Girl talk, Gordon, girl talk. It’s not only men like Hugh who unburden themselves. And your behaviour made quite good gossip at the time, I imagine – especially when the pace became too hot for your ‘‘Girl Friday’’ and she departed when she knew she was going to be named in a nasty, scandalous divorce suit. But Olivia was not willing to take you back, was she? It wasn’t what you had told me at all – that you provided her with the necessary evidence to make things easy for her. She wouldn’t forgive you! And now that you are on the other side of the fence, you don’t like it at all …’
‘Go to your room!’ Gordon’s eyes were blazing fire in his pink face.
‘What?’
‘Go to your room!’
‘Gordon, I am not a child. Do you know how ridiculous you sound?’
‘No, and I don’t care. I have heard enough from you, Elise, and now I shall have my say. The past was all over and done with before I met you, and there is no reason for you to drag it up now except in an attempt to justify your own junketings. Well, that makes no difference now. There will be no more trips to the Peninsula, Elise. You will not leave this house alone again. And if you do not agree to do as I say …’
‘Yes? What will you do if I ignore this ultimatum?’
‘If you do not do as I say, I will divorce you and I will make sure that you never see Alex again.’
The silence was endless. If he had said that the world was coming to an end in half an hour, she could hardly have been more shocked.
