Forsaking All Reason

by Jenny Cartwright

  Guy shook his head and his mouth made that straight, disapproving line she knew only too well. But she stuck to her guns. She was still far too much in love with him to be prepared to leave him to his own devices.

  It was an arduous three weeks. They flew to nine different locations and stayed in nine different grand hotels. During the day Guy took small planes or helicopters or jeeps and set off to visit his plants, which always seemed to be located an inconvenient distance away from the hotels. When he returned he often looked sweaty and dusty and tired. Then he would shower and shave and take her out to eat and then make love with her in the hotel bed. But their lovemaking, though still ecstatic, was conducted at a harder and faster pace than formerly, and afterwards Guy would fall into a heavy sleep.

  ‘Couldn’t we stay somewhere nearer?’ Jane asked plaintively at the fifth stop. ‘You’re away for such ages…I get tired of sightseeing on my own.’

  ‘No,’ returned Guy curtly. ‘There’s nowhere suitable any nearer.’

  ‘Why are all your plants in such out-of-the-way places?’ she sighed, hating to see him looking so tired, and missing the long drawn out nights of passion they had enjoyed in Tuscany.

  ‘Look, you’ve got the whole of Singapore to explore. I’ve arranged for Annabel Roehampton to take you somewhere nice for lunch, and we’re staying at Raffles, which has to be the ultimate. Isn’t that enough?’

  ‘Yes,’ she murmured meekly and looked away, because her dark eyes were sharp and shiny with tears. She didn’t want to have lunch with the honourable Annabel. She wanted to cook lunch for Guy, and eat it with him, preferably in bed. Their own bed.

  It was quite a relief when they arrived at Heathrow. She had imagined that they would be staying in a hotel until they found a home—Guy had said very firmly that his bachelor flat wasn’t suitable—but a taxi took them to central London and deposited them outside the foyer of a block of sumptuous apartments. The porter didn’t know which of them to smarm over first.

  ‘Is this really ours?’ asked Jane as she was led into a fabulous drawing-room, overlooking Regent’s Park, which, although furnished in Victorian style miraculously avoided looking either cluttered or dark.

  ‘Yes. I arranged the purchase through an agent while we were away. Do you like it?’

  ‘Did it come complete with furniture? Or did the previous people just leave everything behind?’ she queried, picking up a Venetian glass paperweight from a small, walnut escritoire and examining it.

  ‘No. I got decorators in,’ said Guy, punching open one door after another and cursorily examining the rooms behind.

  Jane followed him into the master bedroom. The bed was low and wide, carved from ebony, with little rails around the sides and crystal globes on each of the posts. There were low matching tables on either side, complete with stark Japanese lamps, each bearing a calf-bound book. Puzzled, she wandered over to the bed and picked up one of the books. ‘What’s this doing here?’ she asked.

  Guy shrugged. ‘Oh, just one of those touches that designers employ,’ he said casually. ‘I expect they put it there to make the place look lived-in.’

  ‘So we don’t even have to do our own living any more?’ she snapped bitterly, discovering that the book, through beautifully bound, was in German. ‘Do the designers also arrange for someone to come in and eat for us?’

  Guy frowned wearily in her direction. ‘What’s the matter now, Jane?’ he sighed.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said, and honestly, she really did try to say it in a nice voice, but her mouth twisted and her nose wrinkled and her chin puckered and she sniffed very loudly.

  Guy came over to her and patted her absently on the shoulder. ‘Don’t you like the way they’ve done it? Never mind. You can get them back and have it redone any way you choose.’

  And then Jane managed to straighten out her features and smile rather faintly, and say, ‘No. No. It’s fine. Honestly.’

  Guy had sauntered back into the drawing-room, where he found a bottle of Scotch and opened it. ‘It’ll do for the time being,’ he said, pouring himself a large measure, and then mixing a gin and orange for Jane. ‘We’ll have to find somewhere different when we get around to having a family. But this is perfect for the time being. It’s very central.’

  ‘Yes,’ sighed Jane and took the glass from him. Then they sat on silk-covered chairs on either side of a beautiful fireplace filled with dried flowers, and sipped in unison. If anyone had come in they would have thought they looked the picture of the perfect married couple. And they were, weren’t they? This was what they had married for, after all. To create the illusion of perfection. What more could a girl ask?

  Autumn in London was wet and blustery. A yellow machine came past the apartment every morning, scrubbing the street. Men with bins on wheels shovelled up the leaves. A chauffeur brought a car right to the door every time she wanted to go anywhere. Jane would think of the pale, dusty road in Tuscany, turning to mud in the rain, and the diving pool, cold and abandoned and filling up with leaves. And then, of course, she would cry.

  CHAPTER TEN

  JANE and Guy went to dinner with her parents the week after they arrived in London. Her parents were so funny and warm and nice that she could hardly bear to be with them. They made Guy laugh for a start, which she couldn’t do, and her father had a big argument with Guy over the future of genetically engineered lubricants during which Guy didn’t once bother to control his features. He looked animated and cheerful, and very much alive. On top of that, her mother’s apple pie went down a treat.

  Jane told her mother all about the house in Tuscany and the splendid parties and the yacht and gambling in Monte Carlo, and managed to make her mother laugh lots of times without any difficulty at all. When Guy thanked her mother for the hospitality, her mother flushed with pleasure and thanked Guy in return for making her daughter so happy.

  Then Wendy snuggled into the crook of Sidney’s arm and said confidingly to him, ‘You see, Sidney. Guy has made a rich man of you, after all,’ and she winked conspiratorially at Jane.

  ‘What did your mother mean by that?’ Guy asked when they were back in the car.

  Jane winced. ‘Oh,’ she said awkwardly. ‘It was just a little private joke…’ Naturally, believing that Jane and Guy would have no secrets from each other—that every little nuance of their history would have been picked over and cherished—her mother had seen no reason for not referring to her daughter’s teasing remark.

  ‘But what was the joke? That was what I meant…’

  There didn’t seem to be any point in lying. And anyway, it had all been harmless enough. ‘Oh, it was just something that I said when Dad was in the doldrums. He thought you might ease him out of his job if ever you took over the firm, though he said you’d probably make a rich man of him in the process. Mum and I teased him, you know…’

  From the silence in the car she gathered that Guy did not know.

  ‘Um…we just said that even if his life was ruined, he should be jolly glad that Mum and I were going to be rich. That was all,’ she finished awkwardly.

  The silence persisted.

  ‘Look, Guy, it was only a joke!’ she burst out. ‘You know my mother now. She wouldn’t have said something like that seriously, now would she?’

  ‘No,’ conceded Guy. ‘She wouldn’t have.’ And that was that.

  A few miles further on he said, ‘You must invite your parents to stay with us. You’re obviously very close to them, and I like them enormously, too.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jane. ‘Perhaps they could come to lunch one Sunday. It’s only a couple of hours on the motorway.’

  Guy frowned. ‘But Sunday is Gwen’s day off, and anyway, wouldn’t you like them to stay for a few days?’

  Jane smiled bleakly. Not really, she thought. I don’t want them examining the nuts and bolts of our relationship too closely. What she said was, ‘You’d never get Dad away from Garston’s for more than a day. Perhaps I’ll invite Mum down when you�
�re away on business.’

  ‘Do that by all means. It would be an excellent idea. But it would also be nice if they both came to stay when I was there, too,’ returned Guy emphatically. ‘I’d enjoy picking your father’s brains, for a start. He’s a bit of a genius on the quiet.’

  ‘Is he? I’d never thought of him like that,’ said Jane with surprise.

  ‘Oh, yes. Some time ago I tried to poach a couple of his research team. They both pointed out to me that your father was the brains behind the outfit, and I’d be wasting my fat salary cheques if I employed them without also employing the creative genius behind all their new developments.’

  ‘Oh,’ Jane murmured falteringly. So that was why he had wanted to get his hands on Garston’s? Thank goodness he’d given her the shares. Nobody could bid for her father’s brains ever again—even Guy. ‘And Dad, of course, can’t be bought so easily, either,’ she added cuttingly.

  Guy flashed her a disapproving look. ‘Your father is interested in making the perfect engine, not in making money. He’s a man of great integrity, Jane. He works on projects he believes in, in circumstances he feels are right. Did you know that he’d turned down some unbelievably lucrative weapons contracts, because he didn’t like the purpose for which his developments would be used?’

  Jane shrugged. ‘It doesn’t surprise me one bit. Lining his own pockets has never been one of his priorities.’

  ‘I’ve got a few ideas up my sleeve that I’m hoping will interest him,’ Guy said. ‘And if he goes along with me, he’ll make a lot of money whether he likes it or not.’

  So that was it? An extra bonus in selecting Jane for his wife was the fact that Sidney Garston’s brains were there for the picking. Her father would hardly turn down his own son-in-law’s contracts, now would he? A great wave of bitterness assailed Jane. One of the reasons she’d married him—oh, all right, not the real reason, which was that she’d fallen in love with him—but a reason none the less—was that she believed that by doing so she’d save her father from losing his independence to Guy Rexford. And yet it seemed she’d just sold her poor father into slavery after all. No wonder Guy had gone to so much trouble to win her parents’ approval when they’d been going through their fraudulent courtship.

  Jane tugged so hard on the diamond stud in her left earlobe that she almost cried out with pain. ‘I can’t see why you should think that that would interest me,’ she muttered sourly. ‘From now on I don’t want to hear another word about my father and his firm.’

  Guy sighed his insulting sigh. ‘No, Jane. I can quite well see that it doesn’t interest you. I won’t bore you by talking about it further.’

  And then silence really did descend. It was the sort of silence you could cut with a knife. Jane didn’t dare puncture it with so much as a single word. She had seen Guy angry only once, but it was enough for her not to want to incur his wrath while he was behind the wheel of a car. Anyway, what was the point? She’d made it plain to Guy that she wasn’t going to help him win her father’s goodwill any further, and he was furious. She wasn’t going to change her mind, so what was the point of talking?

  During the evening they both made rather awkward attempts to ease the atmosphere a bit. When they went to bed, Jane wondered whether Guy might turn away from her and just go to sleep. It had never yet happened, not even when Guy had been exhausted from visiting his factories, or jet-lagged as he had been once or twice when he returned to Tuscany. But to her surprise Guy claimed her that night with an unusual tenderness. He kissed every inch of her golden, slender body. He lapped at her breasts and trailed his fingers erotically along the fine skin of her inner thighs. He kissed her knees and her toes before finally burying his freshly shaven chin in the hollows of her neck and taking her with a slow gentleness that almost had her screaming with passion.

  When they at last lay spent upon the sheets she looked up at his unyielding face. Even with his eyes closed, even satiated and drained by lovemaking, his features gave nothing away.

  She put one fingertip on the mole on the side of his face and said softly, ‘Guy?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Do you think we could change sides of the bed? I’d rather sleep on the right, I think.’

  ‘Uh-hub…’ and Guy obliging rolled over to her side of the bed, leaving her to clamber across him to the righthand side. Now when she lay and looked at him she couldn’t see the mole. Good. She didn’t want to see it. She didn’t want to be reminded of the extent of her own foolishness.

  The next day they were back to normal. Guy dressed for work in his charcoal suit, and Jane wafted around in silk lingerie, waiting for Gwen to put their breakfast on the table.

  ‘What are you doing today?’ he said as he picked up his briefcase on the way out.

  ‘I’ll arrange some flowers this morning,’ she said. ‘Then perhaps I’ll telephone a few friends.’

  ‘Don’t wear yourself out,’ he returned, and he honestly didn’t sound sarcastic. ‘There’s that reception tonight. Remember?’

  Yes. She remembered. They’d only been in London for a week and already her social diary was filling up. Balls, receptions, dinners, parties. She would have to be very careful not to wear herself out, wouldn’t she? What was more, as she pointed out to Guy, it would be awfully difficult to arrange for both of her parents to come and stay. There just wasn’t the time, was there?

  She and Guy took the London scene by storm. They got their photographs in society magazines and gossip columns with a frequency that was astonishing. ‘Love’s Young Dream’, one headline read. It made Jane shed bitter tears. Because, no matter which side of the bed she slept on, there was still a surfeit of love. But the dream had quite disappeared.

  Her mother came down often when Guy was abroad. Jane put on a brave face, and thought she was doing quite well. But one day her mother went out for a stroll and came back with two pounds of plums in a rustly polythene bag.

  ‘They won’t be the same as the ones off our tree,’ she said, opening the bag and showing them to her daughter. ‘But they’ll make a nice plum duff, all the same.’

  ‘They certainly won’t be the same as the ones off your tree,’ muttered Jane humorously. ‘They won’t be sour and hard, and there’ll be an awful lot more of them in the plum duff than there usually are.’

  And then her mother’s blue eyes caught Jane’s brown ones and they burst into gales of laughter, and, oh, no…no…it couldn’t be happening, could it?…Please don’t let it happen…But it was happening and she was helpless to stop it. Tears started to flood down Jane’s cheeks and her mother’s arms came around her and before she knew what had come over her, the plums were all over the Chinese rug and Jane was sobbing her heart out.

  Her mother led her to the sofa and helped her sit down. She waited patiently, her arm around her daughter’s shoulders until the sobs at last subsided into hiccups.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mum…’ she said, rubbing her fingertips across her damp cheeks. ‘I didn’t mean to do that. It’s just…just…’

  ‘Don’t say anything,’ her mother intruded kindly. ‘You don’t have to explain to me, of all people. There was only one thing in my life that ever made me cry like that, so I do understand. What is it? Doesn’t he want children for a while? Or are you disappointed you’re not pregnant yet?’

  Jane covered her eyes with her hands for a moment. She couldn’t possibly tell her mother the truth. ‘That isn’t exactly the problem…’ she sighed, floundering. ‘It’s just that…well…my life seems so…so…’

  ‘I know. Your life is very empty here in London, isn’t it, darling? Guy’s away so often with his work…but you know, it does all boil down to the same thing in the end. You were made for motherhood, Jane. And of course, being married has brought it one step nearer. You must feel as if you’re just marking time now. I know that I did during those years when your father and I were trying. I couldn’t seem to take a proper interest in anything. Life seemed so pointless for a while.’ She to
ok a deep breath. ‘You must tackle Guy about it, sweetheart. He may think that he would prefer to wait a couple of years, but when he knows how unhappy it’s making you he’ll come around. He loves you so much, after all.’

  Jane looked helplessly at her mother. What had she done by marrying Guy? She had cut herself off from first her father and now her mother. She had thrown away her birthright for…chemistry.

  Matters weren’t improved when Guy returned from his trip, either. They were getting ready to go out to a prestigious dinner and dance arranged to mark the end of a conference of industrialists when the phone rang.

  Guy took the call in their bedroom where Jane was drying her hair.

  ‘Ella!’ he exclaimed, then turned his back on Jane, and began fiddling with his bow tie. ‘Uh-huh. No. Yes. OK. Oh. About an hour? Yes. OK.’

  When he turned back towards her he looked distinctly uneasy.

  ‘No point in getting dressed up, Jane,’ he said apologetically. ‘That was Ella on the phone. She’s in London. I have to see her urgently about business and it would help if she could be with me at this dinner tonight. You don’t mind, do you? It’ll only be this once.’

  Jane felt as if the wind had been knocked out of her. ‘No,’ she said in a voice barely above a whisper, ‘I don’t mind.’

  ‘She’s only in town for the one night, you see, and a couple of the people involved in this deal will be at the function, so it really would be crazy not to—’

  ‘It’s OK, Guy,’ she interrupted in a thin voice, sitting on a chair and bending to examine her toenails. Her damp hair hung in tendrils around her face. ‘Honestly it is. No problem. Please don’t apologise.’ The wife who’d accepted an arranged marriage might not have the right to scream and rant when the mistress appeared on the scene, but none the less she couldn’t bear to hear Guy justifying himself like this. It made her feel quite sick.

  When he had gone she thought she might cry, but her tears once more had turned to gravel and refused to be shed. They felt heavy inside her. They made her angry in a dull, desolate kind of way. They made her feel that something must be done. If he was going to take a mistress when all the papers had exposed them to the world as Love’s Young Dream, then he really had better do it very discreetly. She was getting rather used to her own, private humiliation. A public humiliation would be an entirely different matter.