Old Sins

by Penny Vincenzi

  JULIAN MORELL HAD just banked his first million (having floated his company on the stock exchange a year earlier), when he met Eliza Grahame Black.

  He was then thirty-three years old, and besides being extremely rich and hugely successful, was acknowledged one of the most charming and desirable men in London. Eliza was seventeen, and acknowledged the most beautiful and witty debutante of her year. Julian needed a wife, and Eliza needed a fortune. It was a case of natural selection.

  Julian needed a wife for many reasons. He was beginning to find that having mistresses, whether short or long-term, married or single, was time-consuming and demeaning; he wanted to establish himself in a home and a household of his own; he wanted a decorative and agreeable companion; he wanted a hostess; he wanted an heir. What he was not too concerned about was love.

  Eliza needed a fortune because everything in life she craved for was expensive and she had no money of her own. Being a conventionally raised upper-class girl of the fifties, she was anticipating earning it in the only way she knew how: by marrying a rich (and preferably personable) man. She was not too concerned about love either.

  Eliza’s father, Sir Nigel Grahame Black, was a farmer; he had five hundred acres in Wiltshire and a modest private income, one of his sons was training to be a doctor and the other a lawyer. Eliza came a long way down on the list of demands on his purse, and indeed financing her London season had been largely made possible by her godmother, Lady Ethne Powers, an erstwhile girlfriend of Sir Nigel, who had looked at the potential for investment in her charge (sixteen years old, slender, silvery haired and fine featured, with pretty manners and huge sense of fun) and handed him a cheque for a thousand pounds along with a cup of tea and a cucumber sandwich in her garden the previous September. ‘Give that child a really good Season and she’ll be off your hands by this time next year,’ she said.

  She was right. Dressed charmingly, in clothes made for her by Ethne’s dressmaker, Eliza danced, chattered and charmed her way through the Season, and found her way into every society column, every important party and dance. She adored it all; she felt she had gone straight to Heaven. She was a huge success with the young men she met; but then that had been something of a foregone conclusion. What surprised everybody, not least Eliza herself, was that she also got on extremely well with the other girls, and even succeeded in charming their mothers, something of an achievement given the fact that she was considerably prettier and more amusing than a great many of their daughters.

  This had a lot to do with the fact that she was simply not in the least spoilt. She might have been the youngest in her family, the only girl, and enchantingly pretty, but her mother put a high value on practical accomplishment and a low one on personal appearance; consequently Eliza found herself more sighed than exclaimed over, as her total lack of ability to cook, sew, pluck pheasants, grade eggs, hand rear lambs and indeed perform any of the basic countrywomen’s skills became increasingly apparent. She did not even ride particularly well; nobody looked more wonderful hunting, but it was noticeable that she was invariably near the back of the field. Such virtues as she possessed – her beauty, her wit, and a stylishness which was apparent when at the age of twelve she took to wearing her school hat tipped slightly forward on her head, and lengthening all her dirndl skirts in deference to M. Dior and his New Look – her family put no value on whatsoever.

  Consequently, Eliza grew up with an interestingly low opinion of herself; she did not lack confidence exactly, she knew she looked nice, and that she had a talent to amuse, but she did not expect other people to admire or appreciate her; and when she suddenly found herself that year so much sought after, regarded as an ornament at a party, an asset at a dinner table, it seemed to her entirely surprising and unexpected, a kind of delightful mistake on everybody’s part, and it did not go to her head.

  Everything to do with the Season enchanted her in that Coronation year, when the whole country was in party mood; day after dizzy day whirled past, she was drunk with it, she could not have enough.

  Strangely, her presentation at Court was the least clear of her memories; it was a blur. She could remember the long long queue in the taxi in the Mall, being ushered into the palace, into the anteroom even, but she could never even recall what she wore, nor what Lady Powers wore; who sat next to her on the long wait, whether she talked, whether she giggled, whether she was nervous. She remembered the Queen, looking so very much smaller than she had expected in the throne room, and the Duke of Edinburgh trying not to look bored beside her; and she did always remember making her curtsy because she slightly overdid it, and sank just a little too low, and then it was hard to get up gracefully and she wobbled and was terrified she was going to fall over; but apart from that she could recall very little, apart from an achingly full bladder throughout the entire procedure. ‘Such a waste,’ she would often say to her friends, years later, ‘being in the presence of the Queen of England, and just longing for it to be over so I could go and have a pee.’

  But other things she did remember with extraordinary clarity: Queen Charlotte’s Ball (The Harlot’s Ball as it was christened by the Debs’ Delights with what they considered huge wit). Henley, where she was photographed a dozen times for a dozen newspapers (‘Beautiful Eliza Grahame Black, one of the brightest stars of this year’s Season, arrived at Henley looking particularly appropriate in a white dress with an outsize sailor’s collar and a straw boater that rivalled those of her three escorts’, rambled the gushing diarist of the Daily Sketch). Ladies’ Day at Ascot, perhaps most exciting of all, where she picked three winners and found herself standing next to Princess Margaret and the dashing Billy Wallace in the Royal Enclosure, both of whom smiled most graciously at her. It was an enchanted time; she could do no wrong, it seemed, fortune smiled on her along with everybody else, and finally, in a last, magnificent gesture, tossed a seriously rich man into the guest list at her own dance.

  Eliza’s dance was held in Wiltshire on the second Saturday in July; she wore what she and Ethne termed a proper frock – a shimmering, embroidered cream organza crinoline from Worth. She wore fresh cream and pink roses in her silvery hair, a pearl necklace given to her for her presentation by her grandmother, drop pearl earrings a gift from her godmother on the night of the dance. It was a lyrically perfect evening; the huge marquee was decorated with banks of white roses; there were two bands, one jazz, one swing; there was as much champagne as anyone could wish for, a superb supper served at midnight, breakfast at dawn; three papers sent photographers, there were several minor royals, and every one of the three hundred people invited arrived. ‘I do hope you realize this has cost me a fortune which I certainly don’t have,’ moaned Sir Nigel to Ethne, watching the interminable line of cars driving up and parking in the paddock beyond the house.

  ‘Oh, don’t be so dreary,’ said Ethne, ‘this is an investment, Nigel, and probably a much better one than that new strain of cattle you’ve just put yourself really in debt for. This evening is going to pay dividends. I don’t know how you can look at that daughter of yours and begrudge her a penny. She’s an enchantment, and you ought to be very proud of her instead of regarding her as some kind of useless millstone round your neck. Just look at her, did you ever see anything so lovely? Honestly, Nigel, she’ll make a brilliant marriage. Mark my words.’

  At this moment, most remarkably and punctually on cue, Julian Morell arrived.

  He was not in the habit of attending debutante dances, but his brother James and his wife, as near neighbours of the Grahame Blacks, had been asked to make up a party, and had hauled him out of London for the occasion.

  He came reluctantly, not expecting for a moment that the evening would have any more to offer him at absolute best than some second-rate champagne and some modestly agreeable dancing partners; but he was fond of his brother, he had nothing else to do and besides he was running in a new car, a Mercedes convertible, and the long drive to Wiltshire would serve the purpose well.

  Ne
vertheless, as he arrived he looked with some foreboding at the house and the marquee, wondering if it could actually offer him anything at all that he might actually want.

  It could and it did; it offered him Eliza.

  She stood out, at her party, like a star, a jewel; Julian took one look at her, laughing, dancing in the arms of a pale, aristocratic boy; and felt his heart, most unaccustomedly but unmistakably, in the way of the best clichés, lurch within him.

  ‘Who is that girl?’ he said to his brother who was settling the rest of the party at a table, ‘the one in cream, with the fair hair?’

  ‘That’s Eliza, you fool,’ said James, ‘this is her party. I thought you’d met her at our place. You’ve certainly met her parents, her father’s the local MFH, nice chap.’

  ‘No,’ said Julian, ‘no, I haven’t met her, I would remember her if I had.’

  He sat down and watched Eliza for quite a long time, sipping what he noticed despite his misgivings was excellent champagne, studying her, savouring her, before he made his way over to Lady Powers who was engaged in much the same activity, standing on the edge of the dance floor, briefly unoccupied.

  He had met her once or twice in London; he smiled at her now and took her hand, bowing over it just slightly.

  ‘Lady Powers. Good evening. Julian Morell. You played an excellent game of bridge against my mother once: too good, she never forgave you. How are you?’

  Ethne Powers looked at Julian and recognized instantly the return on her investment.

  ‘She’s pretty, isn’t she, my goddaughter?’ she said after they had exchanged gossip, news of Letitia, of Julian’s company, of the recent flotation which Julian was charmed to discover she had read much about. ‘Would you like to meet her?’

  ‘Oh, I would,’ said Julian, his eyes dancing, knowing precisely what was going through Lady Powers’ mind, enjoying the game, ‘I would very much. And yes, she is extremely pretty. What a lovely dress. Is it Worth?’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ said Lady Powers. ‘What a very unusual man you are. How do you know about women’s dresses?’

  ‘Oh, I make it my business to,’ said Julian, and then (lest the remark should sound in some way coarse, unsuitable, too much of an alien world to this one), went smoothly on, ‘it suits her very well. Shall we catch her now, in between dances?’

  Eliza was flushed and excited now. Two of the roses had fallen from her hair and been thrust into her bosom by some over-enthusiastic partner. She looked quite extraordinarily desirable, a curious mixture of hoyden and high-class virgin.

  Lady Powers moved over towards her and raised her not inconsiderable voice. ‘Darling. Come over here, I want to introduce you to someone.’

  Eliza looked up at Julian and knew she had, quite literally, met her match. He stood out, much as she herself did on that evening, as someone of outstanding physical attractiveness and style. He wore his white tie and tails, as he did everything, with a kind of careless grace; his face was tanned, his dark eyes, skimming over her unashamedly, brilliant and alive with pleasure. As he took her small hand in his she felt his energy, his unmistakable capacity for pleasure, somehow entering her; she met his gaze with frank, undisguised interest.

  To her enchantment, after he had bowed briefly over her hand, said ‘Miss Grahame Black’ and smiled at her, he raised her hand to his lips and gave it the lightest, slightest kiss; something inside Eliza quivered, she felt awed and excited.

  ‘How strange, how sad,’ he said, ‘that we have never met before. Could you spare me a dance? Or would that be too much to hope for?’

  ‘Not quite too much, although not quite straight away,’ she said –bravely, for all she wanted was to fall into his arms and stay there for the rest of the night, and was fearful that he might not wait for her if she did not. ‘I’ve promised the next one and the one after that, but then it would be lovely.’

  ‘I shall wait,’ he said solemnly, ‘and perhaps your godmother will keep me company until then. If not, then I shall simply have to be lonely.’

  ‘Oh, fiddlesticks,’ said Lady Powers, ‘there’s not a woman in this room who wouldn’t like to dance with you. Who did you come with anyway?’

  ‘My brother, James, and his wife, Caroline. Oh, and the Hetheringtons and the Branksome Joneses. Caroline’s parents, the Reever Smiths.’

  ‘Good God,’ said Lady Powers. ‘How perfectly appalling for you. Perhaps you’d better stay with me. Come along, let’s find you a drink, and then you can give me a dance.’

  ‘That would be delightful.’

  But for the rest of the night he danced with Eliza; she was a beautiful dancer, graceful and musical, with a taut suppressed energy that he felt augured well for her sexuality. She was tiny, he realized as he took her in his arms for the waltz; she stood well below his shoulder, it added to her child-likeness. But then she was only seventeen. It was a long long time since he had had anything to do with any woman as young; scarcely a woman either, certainly a virgin, he would have to tread with care.

  Eliza was very much a virgin: she had been repeatedly kissed and occasionally fondled rather as if she was a puppy by the over-enthusiastic under-skilled boys she had met and danced with during her magical summer but that was as far as her sexual experience extended. She had spent her entire life in the company of women; her two brothers had never had any time for her, and although their friends had occasionally remarked on Eliza’s prettiness and her charm, had been very much discouraged from pursuing matters in any way.

  The fondling boys had seemed to her mere accessories, to be worn rather like a hat or a necklace, to set her off to her best advantage, they had touched no chord of feeling of any kind. She had never met a man who had inspired the kind of all-consuming, hungry yearning that most girls – and particularly very innocent girls – fall prey to. She did not spend long hours imagining herself in the arms of anybody in particular, did not dream of any declaration of passionate and lifelong devotion, had not come across anybody at all who made her blush, stumble over her words, whose name made her start, whose image haunted her dreams. The only men she did daydream about were totally beyond reach (most notably Mr Frank Sinatra and Mr Gregory Peck), but she was emotionally, as well as physically, totally untouched and her fantasies were more to do with being discovered and starring in films with them than being crushed to their manly breasts and swept off to nights of passion.

  She found, as did so many very young girls of her background, the thought of nights of passion intriguing but a trifle incomprehensible. Having grown up on a farm, she had no illusions about precisely what took place between the male and female animal, but she found it very difficult to equate that with pleasure and what might take place between her and one of the fumbling boys. The nearest she had ever come to a truly pleasant physical sensation was climbing the ropes at school; then, several times, she had experienced an explosion of pleasure so great she had found it hard to walk normally and casually when she got to the ground. She had asked her best friend if she knew what she was talking about and the best friend said no, so she had assumed there must be something odd about her, and (while continuing the climb the ropes rather too vigorously from time to time in pursuit of the pleasure), had kept quiet about it; it was only at a giggly girls’ lunch during her Season that someone had referred to a ‘real climbing up the ropes feeling’ and she had realized with a surge of relief that she was not a misfit and indeed possibly had much to look forward to at the hands of the fondlers. But it had not come. Yet.

  Dancing with Julian that night, during the extraordinary series of emotions that shot through her, she thought briefly, and to her own surprise, of that conversation and realized that along with happiness, emotional confusion and excitement, and a strange sense that she was no longer in command of herself, certain unexpected and unfamiliar physical sensations were invading her as well. She smiled to herself at the thought, and Julian noticed.

  ‘What are you thinking about?’

  ‘Oh,�
� said Eliza lightly and with perfect truth, ‘school actually.’

  ‘How very unflattering. Here I am, dancing to the very best of my ability and trying to engage you in interesting conversation, and all you can think about is school. Did you like school, Miss Grahame Black?’

  ‘I loathed it.’

  ‘Where did you go?’

  ‘Wycombe Abbey.’

  ‘Oh, well you would have done. I disapprove of boarding school for girls myself.’

  ‘So do I.’

  ‘Then,’ he said lightly, ‘our daughters will all go to day schools or stay at home with governesses. All right?’

  ‘Absolutely all right.’

  It was a conversation she was often to remember in the years ahead.

  Julian was completely unlike anyone Eliza had ever met. It was not just that he was so much older than she was; it was his clothes, his cars, his lifestyle, the things he talked about, the people he knew; and, perhaps most alien to her background and upbringing, the acute importance of money and the making of it in his life. He was obviously immeasurably richer than anyone she had ever met but that was less significant than the fact that he had made his money himself. Eliza had grown up in a society that did not talk about money; and that regarded the making of it in large quantities as something rather undesirable; it betrayed an adherence to a code of values and a set of necessities that found no place in upper-class rural life. Nevertheless he was not what her mother described (in a hushed voice) as a nouveau (had he not after all lived five miles away from her most of his life, been to Marlborough like so many of the fumblers, and ride to hounds and dress with impeccable taste?) So it was hard to define exactly what made him so exciting, gave him just the faintest aura of unsuitability. She only knew that getting to know him was like discovering some totally new, hitherto unimagined country. And she got to know him (as she thought) extremely well and very quickly. He simply never left her alone. At the end of her dance he had said goodbye, very correctly, with the most chaste of kisses on her forehead (much to her disappointment) and driven off to London; she watched the tail lights of the Mercedes disappearing into the darkness and fell into a desperate anxiety that she would never see him again. But he phoned her next morning, thanking her for a wonderful evening, and asking her to dinner on the Monday night.