Jack watched her in silence. No one in his life had ever said anything so nice to him. On the contrary, his Dad, when he wasn’t in prison, used to yell at him and hit him all the time, and his auntie had regarded his arrival on her doorstep as a burden that had been wished upon her by an interfering government.
‘I’ll come back on leave, an’ all that,’ he said to comfort her.
Louise looked up at him, her eyes red and her mouth drooping with misery. ‘Promise?’
‘’Course I promise,’ he said stoutly.
They started walking again, her feet dragging reluctantly.
‘I didn’t think you’d be bothered at my goin’ away.’
‘I’ll miss you terribly.’
‘Really?’ They’d reached the bridge, and as if her legs couldn’t carry her any further, she sank on to the stone ledge, hunched up in her brown winter coat.
‘Yes, really.’ Her tone was adamant. ‘You know that, Jack,’ she added almost accusingly.
For a moment Jack hesitated, then he sat down beside her, and reached for one of her hands. ‘No one’s ever bothered much about me before,’ he confessed, shaking his head.
‘Oh, Jack.’ A wave of tender love swept through her, almost maternal in its intensity. Jack deserved to be loved. It was a cruel world that didn’t recognize that. She squeezed his hand, then felt quite dizzy as their eyes locked.
Mesmerized, she gazed at his smooth fresh face, felt the heat of his skin, took in the curve of his young lips and the golden down on his cheeks, and felt something deep inside herself tremble in surrender. Closing her eyes, because the feeling was so strong it overwhelmed her, she felt his mouth brush hers, lightly at first, and then with the growing desire of youthful excitement.
When she opened her eyes again, she saw his were shut, as if he was concentrating intently on reaching some secret goal.
‘Jack,’ she breathed through her open mouth, as she put her arms around his neck, and felt him pull her close. His tongue was darting into her mouth and across her bottom lip. Oh, my God, she thought. This is how it starts.
* * *
‘Dads?’ Juliet lay on her silver bed with her white telephone beside her.
‘Hello,’ Henry answered, sounding pleased but guarded. He was at his desk in the bank, about to dictate letters to his elderly secretary; all the young ones had left some months before. ‘How are you, Juliet?’
‘I’m fine, but I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news.’
‘Oh? What is it? Are you OK?’
‘Yes, Dads.’ She managed to keep her voice calm, because she knew her father was going to be deeply upset by what she had to tell him. ‘It’s Green Street. Our house had a direct hit last night. I walked round the corner when I came home from work this morning, and I’m afraid there’s nothing much of the inside left. The front it still standing, you can even see fragments of the curtains hanging from the blown-out windows. There’s also some furniture still perched high up on bits of remaining floor, but basically the place has been gutted. It’s a heartbreaking sight.’
There was a shocked silence on the line before Henry spoke. ‘I was afraid this might happen. That’s why all the good stuff is stored at Hartley.’ His voice was flat and weary.
‘I’m so sorry, Dads darling. Thank God we’d all moved out. If there’d been anyone in the building last night, they’d never have survived. Mummy’s going to be devastated, isn’t she?’
‘More upset than you know. The building wasn’t insured, either,’ he added gloomily.
Juliet sat upright in bed, ‘What? Why not?’ she demanded.
‘Is your house insured against a direct hit?’
‘Well, no, I suppose not. I think I’ve only got a normal policy. Oh God, I better get on to Lloyd’s at once.’
‘Don’t waste your time, Juliet. No one is giving an insurance cover for London buildings at the moment.’
Although they’d lived in the building, which belonged to the Westminster Estate, on a long lease, this was nevertheless a great blow.
‘Mummy’s going to go mad,’ she observed. Forty-eight Green Street represented everything Liza had ever wanted in terms of social status, fashion and desirability.
‘I’ll wait until the weekend to tell her,’ Henry mused. ‘Where will you live, Dads? After the war?’
He sighed. ‘That depends on a lot of things. Don’t mention this if you talk to the family, will you?’
Bidding her father good-bye, Juliet replaced the receiver. A moment later the telephone rang. She picked it up quickly. ‘Hello?’
‘I’d recognize that voice if I heard it in a rain forest, on an Arctic floe, by the pyramids or in a Paris night-club,’ said an attractive male voice.
Juliet burst out laughing. ‘Eddie darling! How marvellous to hear from you. How are you? Where are you?’
‘Waterloo Station,’ he chuckled. ‘I’ve got twenty-four hours leave. Can I see you?’
Juliet thought quickly. She was supposed to be lunching with Dick Henage at Le Caprice, having cocktails in the American Bar of the Savoy with Peter Osborne, and then she’d promised to dine with Gerald Knight before he returned to his ship; but on the other hand…
‘I’m as free as a bird for the next twenty-four hours,’ she said blithely ‘Come around right away, if you like.’
By the time Juliet heard the front door ring, she’d cancelled all her engagements, and as Dudley opened the front door, she appeared at the top of the black carpeted silver staircase in a ivory satin negligee, trimmed with lace. Her smile was as scarlet and wicked as ever.
‘Come right up, Eddie,’ she said. ‘Dudley, bring us some champagne, will you?’
Eddie, throwing his cap and greatcoat onto a hall chair, bounded up the stairs two at a time, to be enfolded in Juliet’s welcoming embrace.
‘Oh, God, darling, it’s so good to see you again,’ he groaned, burying his face in the white scented perfection of her neck.
* * *
Liza was waiting for Louise when she slipped through the back door.
‘Where have you been?’ she demanded shrilly, her face flushed with anger. ‘And don’t lie to me, Louise. I know you’re up to something.’
Louise swallowed, determined not to panic. ‘Sorry I’m late for tea, Mummy. I got talking to Janet and Elsbeth on the way home, and I’d no idea it was so late. I’ll wash my hands and come for tea, right away.’
As she tried to duck into the hall cloakroom, Liza grabbed her by the arm. ‘You’re lying, Louise. You’ve been seen walking through the village with some common boy; one of those dreadful evacuees. I’ve said, over and over again, that you’re never to have anything to do with them.’
‘I did stop to say hello to one of the people I dish out luncheon to,’ Louise admitted, lying glibly. ‘We see all the evacuees in the holidays, and we can’t be rude to them if we happen to meet them in the village.’
‘You were seen by Mrs Dobbs. Just you and some boy, so don’t try and lie your way out of it. Don’t you realize these people are the lowest of the low?’
Louise had never seen her mother as angry as this. ‘I can’t be rude if someone says hello to me in the street,’ Louise protested. Inside she felt chilled with fear. Her mother might try and stop her seeing Jack altogether. She might even find out where Jack lived, and go and tell him never to come near her again.
‘Don’t be impertinent,’ Liza scolded. ‘You are not to speak to this ruffian, or any of the other scum from the East End, again. Do you understand?’
Like a whirling dervish, Amanda came streaking down the staircase at that moment, pigtails flying, and the lenses of her glasses enlarging her short-sighted eyes.
‘You cannot talk like that, Mother,’ she exploded in fury. ‘It’s not Christian. There’s nothing wrong with the evacuees, and at least the government realizes that, if you don’t. They’ve been sent to the country, the poor things, to prevent them being killed. When I’m an MP I’m going to make sure they hav
e the benefits we all have. I think it’s very democratic and right of Louise to talk to them and make them feel welcome.’
Liza’s jaw dropped as she regarded her fourteen-year-old daughter with blank horror. The child was a monster. Where had she picked up all this ghastly socialistic stuff? Really, Henry would have to do something.
‘Amanda’s right,’ Louise said, shooting her sister a grateful glance. She’d told Amanda all about Jack… well almost all, and Amanda was encouraging their friendship.
‘You will both be punished for this disgraceful behaviour,’ Liza said in a high-pitched voice. ‘Wait until I tell your father…’
‘Dear me, what ever’s going on?’
Lady Anne came slowly down the stair, regarding them all with disapproving concern.
‘The girls are being extremely rude,’ Liza began defensively, but under the level stare of her mother-in-law, her spirits flagged. ‘I really do think it’s time they both went to boarding school, you know,’ she added, turning and hurrying up the stairs, in an attempt to conceal her emotions. Tears of vexation sprang to her eyes. Louise and Amanda were beyond her control. Why, oh why, were they turning into bolshie rebels? Hadn’t she expounded her belief that women should be sweet and nonconfrontational? Hadn’t she tried to prepare them for marriage to the right man? To be chatelaines of nice country houses? Hadn’t she prepared them to take their places in Society?
Liza lay on her bed, utterly defeated. Her youth had been ruined by the Great War; now her ambitions for her girls were being ruined by this second wretched war. No one would ever know, or understand, how she missed Green Street, too. Everything was changing and not for the better.
Below, in the hall. Lady Anne was speaking to Louise and Amanda in a quiet but firm voice. ‘There is never a need to be rude, and there’s certainly never a need to shout.’
‘But Mummy was saying horrible things about those poor evacuees,’ Amanda protested pleadingly. ‘She really was, Granny. Calling them all sorts of things. Louise and I always say hello, if we see them in the street, and some of them are really sweet.’
Lady Anne knew only too well what Liza thought of the influx of sad children from under-privileged homes.
‘Your mother is allowed to have her own opinion,’ she said diplomatically, ‘I think you’d both better go and apologize to her…’
Amanda looked enraged. ‘Never!’
‘You must, Amanda. Both of you must say you are sorry you were rude to her. And maybe, in future, you should both avoid going on about how sweet you think the evacuees are,’ she added, trying to control her twitching lips. ‘Political opinions are often best kept to oneself.’
Louise said nothing, but a desperate feeling of protectiveness towards Jack made her want to weep.
‘But Granny,’ Amanda argued, ‘you don’t believe the Tories are right, do you? You think everyone should have the same opportunities in life, don’t you?’
‘I have three rules in life, darling, and I’ve always stuck to them.’
The girls looked at her hopefully.
‘I never discuss politics, religion or money,’ she told them firmly. ‘You will get much further in life if you keep your thoughts to yourself.’
* * *
Liza knew she must assert herself, so when she came down for dinner that evening, having accepted Amanda’s apology – ‘Sorry I was rude to you, Mummy, but I still think we should do something to help the poor’ – she commanded Louise to follow her into the library.
‘In future,’ she said crossly, ‘you’re to come straight back from school; you’re to stop going for walks on your own, unless a grown-up goes with you, and if you’re seen talking to some lout of a boy again, you’ll be sent away to boarding school.’
Louise looked at her mother, bemused. The merry, vivacious woman of her childhood, who had looked like a fairy queen in beautiful ballgowns and glittering jewellery, always on her way out somewhere, had been replaced by a discontented shrew, whose faded prettiness was marred by inactivity.
It only took Louise a few seconds to decide on how to react to the situation tactically.
‘I’m sorry, Mummy. I was only being polite, as you’ve always told us to be. It won’t happen again, though. Do you think I should stop helping serve luncheons at the village hall?’
Wrong-footed, Liza blinked. ‘Erm…’ she hesitated. All the girls who helped do the luncheons were from local upper-class families; one was even the daughter of Sir Christopher Boyd, Conservative Member of Parliament. She didn’t want Louise to lose these friends, who might be useful when the war was over.
‘I think you should continue to help, Louise,’ she said. ‘After all, it’s only at weekends and when you’re on holiday and it might look strange if you dropped out now, but avoid talking to the evacuees.’
‘Very well, Mummy.’ Louise smiled primly.
For a fleeting second, Liza was reminded of Juliet when she’d been fifteen; underhand was the unfortunate word that seemed to spring to mind to describe them both.
* * *
‘How did you get caught?’ Amanda whispered to Louise that night, after they’d supposedly gone to bed. They were curled up on the window-seat of Louise’s bedroom, the only light coming from a moon that seemed to drift behind banks of clouds from time to time.
‘Mrs Dobbs.’
‘The traitor!’
‘Ssh-h-h.’
‘But you’re not going to stop seeing Jack, I hope?’
‘Of course not, but I’ve got to get a message to him, to tell him what’s happened.’ Louise hugged her knees to her chest, and buried her face. ‘Damn Mrs Dobbs.’
‘Why don’t you write him a note? I can slip it to him while he’s waiting for you after school. You’d better go home another way, though. Just until the dust settles.’
Louise looked up, brightening. ‘Would you really? Thanks awfully. But how am I going to meet him, now?’
‘Slip out of the house, when everyone’s gone to bed?’
‘Golly!’
‘Tell him, in the note, where you want to meet him, and when.’
‘I know where.’ Louise’s voice had a yearning note, as she thought of the grassy bank, under the hawthorn tree. ‘This is like Romeo and Juliet, isn’t it?’ she continued, dreamily.
Amanda wasn’t sure about that, but she was game for anything that cocked a snook at their mother.
* * *
Eddie cupped Juliet’s face in his hands. ‘I wish I could stay here for ever.’ They’d stayed most of the day in bed, but now he was taking her to dine at the Berkeley. It was the last night of his leave and he was having to rejoin his regiment the next morning.
She slid her arms around his waist. ‘I wish you could, too,’ she whispered, pressing herself close to him. Edward was the only person who could blot out the memory of Daniel for a few hours, and she was going to miss him like hell when he returned to his unit in the morning.
Today, for the first time, she’d actually felt happy. They’d drunk champagne, licked caviar from mother-of-pearl spoons, and made love, again and again, as the sun rose over the trees in the park before sinking in a glorious blaze, tinting her silver bed ruby red.
Then they’d shared a gardenia scented bath, and she dressed in a clinging primrose yellow evening gown, with a matching ostrich feather cape.
Edward couldn’t take his eyes off her. ‘Let’s not make it a late night, so we can go back to bed,’ he murmured, gazing into the depths of her pale blue eyes, ‘I have to leave so damned early in the morning.’
Juliet nodded, her scarlet mouth promising him one more night of passion.
As they enjoyed their dinner, and the small band played loud enough to muffle the sound of distant dropping bombs, Juliet refused to even think about what had happened to the Café de Paris. The Berkeley Hotel, she told herself, was a stout building, not as big as the Ritz opposite, but nevertheless high and well built. Even so, as she clung to Edward on the dance floor, she had a
strange feeling of dread.
‘When are you next on leave?’ she asked, as they went back to their table for coffee.
He shrugged. ‘God knows, darling. I’m being posted “somewhere abroad”, as they say, so I don’t know when I’ll be home again.’
‘Will you write?’
He took her hand and held it tightly. ‘We should have done all this years ago,’ he said regretfully.
‘You weren’t interested in me years ago, except as a friend,’ she replied, smiling.
Edward’s eyes widened. ‘I must have been mad! I’ll never forget how wonderful you looked at your Coming-Out Ball, and all those parties we went to.’
‘Not to mention the ones we gate-crashed.’
He laughed. ‘God, those were good times, weren’t they? And we had no idea what lay ahead.’ He looked serious again. ‘I should have asked you to marry me then.’
Juliet looked startled. ‘I wonder if I’d have accepted? It would certainly have spared me the nightmare of my marriage to Cameron,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘but we were different people then, weren’t we? So young. Inexperienced. It was, after all, seven years ago.’
Edward took a gulp of his wine. His face was suddenly pale.
‘Juliet?’
‘Yes?’
‘Would you say “yes” now, if I asked you to marry me? On my next leave?’
Marry Edward? she thought, taken aback by his seriousness. The idea had never occurred to her. He’d been a chum, a pal, someone to have a laugh with when she’d been seventeen. But now? Yet today, she had to admit she’d been really happy, so maybe it wasn’t such a crazy idea? They got on together, he was a tender and inventive lover, and he had a sense of humour. He was nice looking, especially in uniform, they liked the same things, and perhaps… perhaps accepting his proposal would stop her present rackety existence. Her constant obsessive yearning for Daniel. Maybe Edward could become the focus of her love life?
The Granville Affaire Page 17
