The Collector's Daughter

by Gill Paul

  He held out his hand to pull her onto his lap and when they kissed, he seemed tentative, although there was no doubting the lust they felt for each other. She pressed herself against his body and kissed him till she was in a frenzy of desire. She could feel that he had stiffened beneath his trousers, but she was nervous that the guard might interrupt them, so she pulled away and reached for her champagne glass.

  “I have a wedding present for you,” he said. “I couldn’t bring it with me but I have a photograph.”

  He pulled it from his jacket pocket and handed it over. It showed a foal, a newborn by the looks of things, its twig-like legs bowed, unused to bearing weight.

  Eve stared at him in astonishment. “Did you buy him? Or is it a her?”

  “Yes. Porchy helped me choose. He’s a bay, born to the Derby winner Endicott. I thought you might stable him at Highclere, and that will give you lots of opportunities to visit. I know how much you miss it.”

  “You bought me a horse!” It was such a magnificent gift, she couldn’t take it in.

  “We can visit him as soon as we get back from Paris. I left it for you to name him.”

  Eve looked from the photograph to her husband’s grinning face and felt tears coming. It was the most thoughtful gift she’d ever received. The name flashed into her head: “Miraculous,” she said. “Because he’s a little miracle.”

  “So are you,” Brograve said, touching her cheek. “You are my little miracle.”

  * * *

  The honeymoon was not the romantic idyll Eve had dreamed of when they first got engaged because she couldn’t shed her sadness. They ate some wonderful French food and drank fine wines, and every night they had a flutter in a casino, just as she knew Pups used to do when he was in Paris. By day they caught a steamboat along the Seine, climbed the Eiffel Tower, strolled in the Tuileries, and visited Sacré-Coeur in Montmartre. Eve had to trot to keep up with Brograve because one of his steps was equivalent to two or three of hers.

  The biggest shock was that, despite the passion she felt for her new husband, the physical side of marriage did not come easily. On the first night in their hotel suite, in a four-poster bed with hangings embroidered in gold thread, they attempted to make love, but it was so painful for Eve that they had to give up. It wasn’t a slight pain, like a headache after drinking too much gin, or a finger accidentally slashed on a kitchen knife; this was excruciating, as though her flesh were being ripped apart, and she screamed out loud.

  Brograve was distraught to have hurt her so badly, while Eve was distressed to have failed at the first hurdle in her new role as his wife. Something must be wrong with her. Married couples the world over performed this act; why couldn’t she?

  “We’re both tired,” Brograve said, kissing her forehead. “And there’s no rush. We have all the time in the world.”

  She insisted on trying again the following night, and the next, but it was too painful to proceed. By their last night in Paris, two weeks later, they had still not managed to consummate their marriage and it cast a cloud on the romance. Over a quiet dinner in Montmartre, Eve asked Brograve a question that had been on her mind.

  “Have you ever made love to a girl before? You can tell me the truth. I don’t mind if you say yes.”

  “No.” He shook his head straightaway. “I always wanted to wait till I was married. During the war there were opportunities—French girls who would do it for food or money—but the men who tried usually ended up with syphilis.”

  “Good. I’m glad we will be each other’s only lovers,” she said, squeezing his knee under the table.

  “Maybe if I had more experience . . .” he began, but didn’t finish the sentence.

  “It’s not you, it’s me,” Eve said. She had been experimenting in their bathroom and realized there was enough room inside her. “I seem to tense up when you try to enter.”

  “You’re still traumatized by your father’s death,” he said. “I’m in no rush. We’re both young and healthy, and I’m sure it will simply happen one day.”

  Eve wasn’t so sure. If the problem lay in her being too tense, perhaps there was a solution. She gulped down her glass of Saint-Émilion and gestured for the waiter to refill it. When the bottle was empty, she motioned for him to bring another. Brograve looked bemused but didn’t attempt to stop her.

  Eve was so plastered she had to cling to his arm as she staggered back to the hotel. As soon as they were in their room, she stripped off her gown and pushed him backward onto the bed, unfastening the buttons at the front of his trousers.

  “Now!” she said. “Do it to me now!”

  It still hurt a lot, and there was blood on the gold coverlet, but she and Brograve were joined properly for the first time. As she lay in his arms afterward, with a throbbing between her legs and the beginnings of a hangover jabbing her temples, she was happy. There were times in life, she thought, when you just had to push through pain in order to get to the other side.

  * * *

  Brograve sensed that Eve wasn’t listening to the conversation with Maude and Cuthbert. She was staring out the Savoy River Room’s window, watching the boats go by on the Thames, and hadn’t touched the finger sandwiches on her plate.

  “I can still speak French,” she announced suddenly. “Je peux encore parler français. I just realized that. It means I’ll be able to talk to people when we go to Paris.”

  She was excited and Brograve felt warm inside. “Those years of childhood lessons with a French tutor paid off. You’ve always been more fluent than I am.”

  He noticed Maude and Cuthbert glancing at each other, just quickly, and he knew what they were thinking: Eve wasn’t herself again, not yet. Maybe she never would be. But in all the ways that mattered she was still the woman he’d married, and he loved her more than ever.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  London, March 1973

  Patricia took Eve out for an afternoon while Brograve attended a formal lunch at the gentlemen-only Garrick Club. She had managed to get them an appointment with Leonard of Mayfair, hairdresser to the stars. Eve knew he cut the hair of Elizabeth Taylor and Jackie Kennedy, but when she tried to get him to gossip about his celebrity clients, he refused with a smile, meeting her eyes in the mirror.

  “Let’s talk about you instead,” he said. “What’s happening in your life?”

  Eve found herself telling him about her latest stroke, and about how hard it was to have memory lapses, and, as she talked, Leonard quietly worked miracles. Afterward she wished she had watched his technique instead of chatting away. He cut layers into the hair that had always been so frizzy and wayward, and when he finished it sat effortlessly around her face in a style that made her look years younger. She gasped with delight.

  Patricia asked for a sculpted bob, like the signature look Leonard had created for Twiggy. While Eve waited, a young girl filed her nails, painting them a pretty peach color and massaging her hands with hand cream. She felt thoroughly spoiled.

  Afterward they went to an Italian restaurant in Shepherd Market for a salad and a glass of champagne. Eve gazed at her daughter, so pretty with her new haircut, and felt grateful that she lived nearby. Mrs. Jarrold’s daughter had emigrated to Australia and tears came to her eyes whenever she mentioned her.

  “Dad told me you’ve been talking to an Egyptian academic about Tutankhamun,” Patricia commented. “It’s nice they still want your knowledge after all these years.”

  “I know,” Eve replied. “I think they’re trying to make sure I tell them everything before I kick the bucket.”

  “Mum!” Patricia tutted dismissively, but it was true.

  “She wants me to find that gold container with the smelly unguent inside, the one that came from the tomb. Do you remember it?”

  “How could I forget?” Patricia exclaimed. “I was traumatized that time you dragged me into the bathroom and washed my hair in cold water and soap just because I had touched the damn thing.”

  “Was it cold
?” Eve made a face. “I’m sorry.”

  “You totally overreacted and scared the life out of me.” Patricia sipped her champagne. “Thinking back, that container must be valuable. From the weight of it, I reckon it was solid gold.”

  “Any idea where it might be?” Eve asked.

  Her daughter shrugged. “I haven’t seen it since the day of the hair-washing trauma. Didn’t you think it might be cursed? I remember you muttering something to that effect.”

  “Of course not!” Eve shook her head for emphasis. “But you never know what the Egyptians put in those unguents. It could have burned your skin.”

  She felt ashamed, thinking back, but she’d done what mothers do—protected her child from possible danger. That instinct to keep Patricia from harm was as strong as ever, even now that she was in her forties. There had been four car bombs in London the previous month, planted by the IRA, and she had been unable to think or speak until she got Patricia on the phone and knew that she, Michael, and her grandsons were safe.

  * * *

  Eve was ringing Ana Mansour regularly now. She was curious about this woman with whom she shared a love of archaeology, and enjoyed hearing about her life. It was rare to make a new friend at her age, especially with the sheltered life she and Brograve were living while she recuperated. One day she asked about the discovery of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, and Ana told her that exploration was an exception in that it had been led by a woman, Honor Frost.

  “I’m not a diver,” Ana said, “so I wasn’t down there on the seabed when she identified parts of the ruins in the eastern harbor. It wasn’t a dramatic moment in the way the opening of Tutankhamun’s tomb was—rather, it was the result of forensic examination over a period of months, and lots of cross-checking with existing records, which is where I came in. But I was thrilled to be part of it, of course.” She laughed. “Not nearly as thrilled as when I managed to meet you.”

  “I’ve been wondering how you tracked me down,” Eve said. “It can’t have been easy.”

  “On the contrary,” Ana replied. “I saw your interview in The Times after the British Museum exhibition opened, so I knew your married name, and then I found your Framfield address in Who’s Who.”

  Eve was puzzled. What interview? What exhibition? “Is the exhibition still on?” she asked, testing the water.

  “No, it closed in December, but it was the most popular exhibition in their history. Over a million people came to see it. Tutankhamun clearly still has the power to draw a crowd.”

  There had been a Tutankhamun exhibition in London? “I wish I’d seen it,” Eve said.

  There was a long pause. “You did,” Ana said. “You were at the opening ceremony, with the Queen. That’s when the Times journalist interviewed you and loads of papers ran your photograph, posing alongside the funeral mask.”

  “Really? What year was that?”

  “Last year. March 1972.”

  Eve sighed. Her stupid memory. “I expect I’ve got the article in my cuttings book,” she said, then she cast around for a way to change the subject, embarrassed by her lapse. “How are your children? Have you spoken to them recently?”

  “No.” Ana sounded forlorn. “My husband’s mother has asked me not to telephone or write to them anymore. She said it’s upsetting for them.”

  “What?” Eve was horrified. “She can’t do that! Children need their mothers. Can’t your husband have a word?”

  There was a pause. “It’s more complicated than that.”

  Eve heard her strike a match. She’d always liked the smell of matches. Was it sulfur? She couldn’t remember.

  “My husband and I are divorced,” Ana said. “I didn’t plan to tell you because lots of people don’t approve of divorce, but I feel as though I can confide in you.”

  “Of course you can!” Eve exclaimed. “Gosh, I’m so sorry to hear that.”

  “He got custody of the children and took them to live in his mother’s house so she can raise them while he runs his business.”

  “But they’d be far better off with you than their grandma,” Eve protested. “What judge made such a crazy decision?” She didn’t know anyone who was divorced, hadn’t even realized it was possible in a Muslim country.

  Ana inhaled her cigarette and blew out before replying. “It’s the way things are in Egypt. If I behave myself I’m allowed to see them from time to time. When I have enough money, I plan to hire a lawyer and fight for more access.”

  Eve was scandalized. “I’ve never heard the like! In this country, judges almost always give custody to the mother. It’s the natural way of things. Oh, I’m so sorry, my dear. I wish I could help.”

  “Well . . .” Ana took another drag on her cigarette. “I’m hoping you find some of the lost Tutankhamun pieces; then I’ll be able to return to Egypt and press on with my case.”

  “Gosh, I hope so,” Eve said. “I’ll do my absolute best. We’re visiting Highclere in the first week of April and I’ll have a look there too.”

  Afterward, she couldn’t stop thinking about Ana’s situation. It must be heart-breaking. She considered telling Brograve when he got back from his walk, to see if he knew anyone who might be able to help, but something stopped her. He didn’t have so many contacts in government since he’d retired, and besides, she had a feeling he wouldn’t approve of her telephone conversations with Ana.

  Instead she went to look in her cuttings book, which was in the cupboard in Sionead’s old room, empty now that she had gone to live with some other people. The Times interview Ana had spoken of was at the back of the book.

  The first thing Eve noticed was that the photo they’d used wasn’t too bad. Her hair had behaved itself for a change, and the suit she’d chosen showed off her trim figure. They had printed some lovely old pictures of her, Pups, and Howard Carter standing outside the tomb. Harry Burton must have taken them.

  She had a pang of missing Pups. She’d never stopped missing him but sometimes it came back with a sudden intensity. Spiritualists would probably say his spirit was visiting her at those times. It was a nice thought.

  The director of the British Museum was in one of the photos, and Eve remembered his face. He looked nice. Might she have given him the gold container for his exhibition? That would have been a logical thing to do . . . But if she had, Brograve would know about it, so that couldn’t be right. Funny that Patricia remembered her thinking it was cursed.

  She left the cuttings book out on the spare bed, open to the page, planning to read the article later, but then she forgot and when she next came to look for it, it was gone. It was infuriating the way she kept losing things these days, as if objects in their flat had a life of their own. She rearranged the ornaments one day and the next they were all in the wrong places again. Maybe Mrs. Jarrold was moving them. That must be it.

  Chapter Forty

  Highclere Castle, April 3, 1973

  Brograve decided to drive them to Highclere. Sometimes they caught the train but Eve’s walking was still unsteady. Besides, they were going for a week and had a suitcase each. The weather was unpredictable, switching from sunshine to showers in the blink of an eye, and they needed clothes for all eventualities because they tended to spend a lot of time outdoors. These days there were never any porters in railway stations to help with your luggage so it was tricky for elderly folk like them.

  “I still miss driving,” Eve remarked, as she watched him switch on the ignition. She could feel the vibrations, hear the change in engine noise as he raised the clutch and pressed on the accelerator. She used to love being behind the wheel, but she’d gotten tunnel vision after one of her strokes and the doctors said it wasn’t safe for her to drive. It had been a bitter disappointment.

  After they married, Brograve had bought a Ford Model T, which was a practical car for driving around town. She used it more than he did, because he was at work during the day. She sped around shopping and visiting friends, or driving to Highclere to visit Miraculous, then g
oing to race meets once he was ready for the track.

  In 1929, Brograve had given her the best birthday present ever—a car of her own, an Austin Seven with dark green paintwork and leather seats. She couldn’t stop grinning as she took it out for a test drive. It was smooth to run, with an engine noise like the purr of a big cat, and the top speed was said to be seventy miles per hour. No one was allowed to drop so much as a crumb in that car. When she collected Patricia from school, she put a piece of carpet in the footwell to protect it from muddy feet.

  Eve sucked in her lips to stop herself criticizing Brograve’s driving on the way to Highclere. He was too cautious in London traffic; you had to be decisive and push your nose out or it took all day to get anywhere. He rode the clutch too, which would wear out the gearbox.

  “Do you know if Porchy has a lady friend at the moment?” Brograve asked, with merriment in his eyes. “One of his boozy floozies?”

  Eve tried to remember. She spoke to her brother on the telephone every week or so but he rarely confided in her about his women. Catherine, his first wife, the mother of his two children, had left him back in the 1930s. Their great love affair, conducted against a background of parental disapproval, had not survived his philandering and her fondness for the bottle. Which came first, Eve wasn’t sure. To her great sadness they divorced and Catherine lived in Switzerland now, from where she sent them a Christmas card every year.

  His second marriage to an American actress called Tilly hadn’t lasted long at all—Eve and Brograve scarcely got to know her—before she fled back to the States. Since then there had been a string of mistresses but Eve could never remember their names. Mabel? Ivy? They didn’t stick around. Happiness in love was something her brother struggled with.

  “We’ll find out soon enough,” she said.

  She felt emotional heading back to Highclere. Being there made her think about Pups’s funeral, and about her mother’s sudden death just three years earlier. Almina had choked on a piece of chicken, of all things. Both her parents had died unexpectedly, and it made her sad to dwell on them. Of course, there were happy memories at Highclere too, if she delved further back: parties on the lawn during long summer evenings, cantering around the estate on her pony, swimming in the lake with Porchy. As they turned into the twisting driveway and the turreted towers came into view, she felt a quickening of her pulse. Although she had loved Framfield dearly, in many ways Highclere was still home.