Rosie Thomas 4-Book Collection

by Rosie Thomas

  ‘I just wondered.’

  They reached what seemed to be the last majestic gateway. The road wound out of the village, into the tidy countryside again.

  The gates were wrought iron, with intricate curlicues, but they stood open. The Porsche rolled between them, gravel crunching under its fat tyres. The driveway was lined with green-black sentinels of conifers, rigorously clipped. Beyond them there were lawns dotted with bigger trees, bare branches dipping towards the wet grass.

  The driveway widened to a semicircular sweep; there was a handful of big, shiny-looking cars parked here, and enough space for a dozen or so more. Harriet looked up to the house itself.

  It was built of stone, grey today but probably golden in sunlight. There were three rows of small-paned windows, another row of mansard windows above those in the steep-pitched roof. There were the clusters of tall chimneys that had been visible over other walls, but more of these. The house had a main front, but there were also shorter, projecting wings that made it look as if the building had grown comfortably, but haphazardly, on a human scale.

  There must be at least fifteen bedrooms, Harriet thought. The house was huge, but it managed to look intimate. It was grand, but at the same time it fitted comfortably into the setting of this opulent village.

  She couldn’t fault Martin Landwith’s taste. Parts of his house must date from the sixteenth century, it was clearly the jewel in a remarkable collection of gems that made up the necklace of Little Shelley. Martin must have had to trade up with particular diligence to achieve it.

  Robin’s car slid into place beside a bronze-coloured Rolls Royce.

  ‘It used to be the manor house,’ he remarked. ‘Lord Nuffield owned it at one time, the estate of the Earls of Oxford before that. The rest of the village grew up around it.’

  He came round to Harriet’s side of the car and opened the door for her. Politely, he helped her to her feet. For a moment, she needed his arm to lean on. She had had a sudden glimpse of the meaning of real wealth, and it had made her dizzy.

  ‘It’s very impressive,’ she said because, in a way, it was.

  The lawns and the gravel sweep were divided from the house by a paved terrace. On the terrace, guarding the front door, sat a pair of seemingly life-sized lions, the carved stone pocked with age and softened with lichens. Harriet and Robin passed the lions’ scrutiny and entered the house.

  Harriet had a brief impression of a high hallway with a flagged floor and a pair of carved chests in dark oak, before Robin steered her through double doors into a long drawing room.

  At first glance, the effect was of discreet but extreme opulence, created equally by the room and the people gathered in it. A woman detached herself from the group and came across the Aubusson to greet them.

  ‘Robin, darling.’

  Harriet recognised her instantly from the silver-framed picture in Robin’s bedroom. The cloud of dark hair was casual by way of expensive artifice, the heart-shaped face was strikingly lovely, but the expression was less innocently sweet than in her photograph. There was level appraisal in her eyes, and a readiness to disapprove and then to dismiss. Robin kissed her and she cupped his face, briefly, in her long, manicured hands.

  ‘Harriet, this is my mother. Mummy, this is Harriet Peacock.’

  Robin’s mother held out her hand and Harriet took it. ‘Mrs Landwith, how do you do?’

  ‘Hello, Harriet. Won’t you call me Annunziata?’

  I’ll try, Harriet thought, with a touch of hysteria. What does Martin call you in bed, surely not that? Nancy?

  Annunziata Landwith scrutinised her. Uncharacteristically Harriet had not been quite sure how to dress for the occasion. In the end she had opted for a chrome-yellow Kamali tunic and black leggings, hoping that if it was too informal it would at least look youthful and wacky. But it clearly didn’t pass muster with Nancy. Any more, she guessed, than she did herself. Probably Robin’s mother didn’t approve of any of his girlfriends whose families and financial pedigrees were unknown to her.

  For her own part, Harriet noted that Robin’s mother was wearing couture Chanel, a long-jacketed suit in ecru wool with gilt buttons, and heavy ropes of pearls. There was, in any case, no competing with that.

  Harriet followed her hostess across the room to be introduced to her fellow guests. Second impressions of the drawing room confirmed the first. The effect of luxury had been achieved by padding every surface, not once but twice.

  There were deep buttoned sofas piled with antique embroidered cushions. The thick curtains were secondarily curtained with deep swags, draped tails and tassels, and the side tables were skirted with silk cloths and then draped again with silvery blue and green Fortuny overskirts. Over the thick carpet an enormous antique rug had been laid, on which soft pink embroidered roses coiled against a background of misty blues and greens. There were lamps with shades of pleated silk and even the frames of photographs, dotted all over the room, were padded with velvet and petit point.

  As all the softness and richness rose up to swallow her, Harriet felt a moment of longing, and of deep, pure affection, for Jane Hunter’s house in Hackney.

  What do I like? she thought wildly. And where do I belong?

  Not here. Anywhere but here.

  There were perhaps a dozen other people, standing in a loose semicircle with glasses in their hands, in front of a log fire. They were all older than Robin and Harriet, silvery-haired men still exercise-fit, and slim-waisted women with swollen coiffures whose clothes carried the sheen of money. There was no cause for Harriet to feel conscious of her diamond here. As she shook hands she saw creamy-varnished fingernails offset by rows of diamonds, cabochon earrings the size of golfballs, and an emerald pin at the neck of one woman’s blouse that made her remember the jewel-house at Topkapi Palace through which she and Charlie and the others had passed with their backpacks more than a decade ago.

  ‘Robin’s friend, Harriet. All of you know Robin, of course, don’t you?’

  Robin passed among them, urbane, secure behind the screen of his expensive manners. Harriet thought, what can I say to these people? There was no sign of Martin, even, who might perhaps have been counted as an ally.

  Then she saw that one of the guests had been overlooked in the round of introductions. She was sitting to one side of the room, in an armchair half-turned to the windows that looked over the garden. Her skinny legs, in tartan trousers, were drawn up beneath her and her shoes might just, unthinkably, have been in contact with the honey-coloured upholstery. She was perhaps ten years old, and she was wearing an expression of mutinous boredom.

  A man in a dark jacket and striped trousers, carrying a silver tray, passed between Harriet and the child. Harriet took the champagne flute that he offered her, and watched him bend slightly to offer a tumbler of plain orange juice to the child. She took it, not looking at him, her expression unaltered. A child of these people, without question, Harriet diagnosed. She wondered which of the silky, silvery couples could be her parents.

  Harriet sipped her champagne, and then slipped sideways around the chattering group. There was a buttoned ottoman with gilded claw feet close to the child’s chair and Harriet sat down on it, bringing their eyes level.

  ‘I’m sorry we weren’t introduced,’ she said. ‘My name’s Harriet.’

  The child looked at her, but said nothing.

  ‘What’s your name?’ Harriet prompted.

  The girl frowned. ‘I’m only a child, you know,’ she pointed out in a clear voice with a distinct American accent. It was a surprise in this room full of drawling and baying English. ‘Children should be seen and not heard.’

  Harriet grinned. ‘Do you believe that?’

  ‘As a child, I can’t really believe or disbelieve, can I? It’s a grown-up thing. Do you believe it?’

  Harriet thought of Jane’s two-level party, giving the girl’s question proper consideration. ‘Children are people too. They deserve the same hearing as everyone else. Not more, a
s some of them seem to expect, but certainly not less either.’

  Now it was the girl’s turn to consider. ‘Where I come from, children are to be brought out and shown off once in a while. In the right clothes, for parties or horse riding or all that stuff. Then they’re to be put away again until the next time.’

  ‘I see. Where do you come from?’

  The child shrugged. ‘Sometimes I live in Little Shelley, sometimes in LA. In Bel Air,’ she added, unnecessarily.

  Harriet wondered which of these men was in film finance, dealing in picture-budget millions. Any one, or quite possibly all of them.

  ‘I see, again. Aren’t you going to tell me your name?’

  ‘It’s Linda.’

  Harriet put her hand out. ‘How do you do, Linda?’

  The child shook hands, and then she sighed. ‘OK, you’ve done your stuff.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You’ve been nice to me. You can go back to the party now.’

  Harriet was amused by her rudeness, rather than rebuffed as Linda had probably intended.

  ‘Suppose I don’t want to?’

  The child eyed her. She had a pale, peaky face and colourless hair cut straight with a square fringe, but her eyes were wide, dark brown and lively. ‘You could come for a walk in the garden with me. There’s a swing. Not much else but it’s better than in here.’

  Harriet glanced round the room. Annunziata’s straight back was turned to her, and Robin was sitting on a distant sofa between two coiffures.

  ‘Aren’t you allowed to?’ Linda challenged her.

  ‘I’m allowed to do anything that doesn’t embarrass or inconvenience other people,’ Harriet said pompously. ‘That’s grown-up manners, and worth remembering. I can’t see any reason why I shouldn’t take a stroll in the garden with you.’

  They stood up together, Linda wriggling in her tartan trews and Shetland jersey. As they passed Robin’s sofa Harriet leant between the rival auras of Joy and Arpège and murmured, ‘I’m going out into the garden for ten minutes, for a walk with Linda. She’s a very nice child.’ Either of those women, of course, could be her mother. ‘Will Annunziata mind?’

  ‘Of course not,’ Robin was obliged to answer. But Harriet was left in no doubt that her behaviour was eccentric. Smiling a little, she shepherded Linda through double doors, out into the hallway where the man in the black jacket sprang to open the front door for them, and on out into the colourless sunshine.

  Linda ran in a wide circle, her arms windmilling, like a big dog let off the leash. She leapt on to the sloping back of one of the lions, clinging on like a monkey and scraping long weals in the mellow lichen with her old-fashioned barred shoes.

  ‘You’d better not do that,’ Harriet observed. ‘At least, not in full view of the house.’ Linda smiled for the first time, her face suddenly sunny. She scrambled down and ran to Harriet’s side. ‘OK. Let’s go and do things out of sight.’

  Linda ran and Harriet followed, slowly at first and then sprinting to catch up. Their feet left skidding tracks in the wet grass. It was cold, but a burst of speed made Harriet’s blood sing. It was exhilarating to be in the clear air after the muffled drawing room, and she sympathised with Linda’s mutinous indoor appearance.

  They headed for the most distant corner of the garden, and there they found the promised swing. The metal frame was rusted, but the structure looked safe enough.

  ‘Push me,’ Linda commanded.

  ‘Can’t you swing yourself?’

  ‘I like it better if I’m pushed.’

  ‘I’ll give you five big ones to get you started.’

  Linda swung, stretching the sodden toes of her shoes higher and higher, and Harriet surveyed the garden. There were big flowerbeds with geometrically neat edgings, the bare earth well turned and the twiggy shrubs regimentally pruned. There must be a gardener somewhere, to whom these beds were a pride and joy.

  Linda swept in more exultant arcs. ‘Look at me! Am I higher than the bar?’

  ‘Be careful.’ Harriet tried to imagine Robin swinging as a little boy, muddy and defiant, and failed.

  ‘Have you been here to play before, Linda?’

  ‘A couple of times. Their pool’s bigger than ours.’

  Harriet walked to an opening in a box hedge and found the swimming pool enclosed by its formally clipped walls. There was a pool house like a tiny classical temple. The springboard had been removed and its brackets poked up forlornly. Harriet peered down into the empty blue rhomboid, suddenly depressed by the garden’s barrenness. She went back to Linda and when the child saw her she dragged her feet to slow the swing’s momentum and then leapt to the ground.

  ‘What shall we do now?’

  ‘I think we’d better go back to your mother.’

  Linda stared scornfully at her. ‘My mother? My mother’s in Phuket. She doesn’t like Christmas. Or England.’

  ‘Your father, then.’ Harriet wasn’t sure where Phuket was.

  The sullen expression was back. ‘All right, then. But he won’t be bothered, you know.’

  They walked, Linda stabbing her toes into the lawn as if she wanted to dig it up. Harriet longed to ask her inquisitive questions about the Landwith set-up and her father’s relationship to it, but it seemed faintly dishonourable to milk a child for information.

  She contented herself with, ‘Do you live near here?’

  Linda tilted her head without enthusiasm. ‘Over there.’

  One of the big houses, hidden behind walls, rich sanctuaries. Harriet couldn’t think of anything else to say. They were almost back at the house before Linda broke the silence.

  ‘I really like your clothes,’ she said.

  ‘Do you? Thank you very much.’

  ‘Yeah. They’re neat. I hate mine.’

  ‘You look fine.’ She did, in fact, look slightly old-fashioned, like a child in a Fifties picture-book illustration. She also had the air of being deliberately under-dressed for the Landwiths’ elegant party.

  ‘My dad likes me to wear this sort of stuff. He thinks it’s appropriate, like from his childhood. My mom likes fancy things, I told you. I’ve got two wardrobes, kind of, and I hate them both.’

  ‘What would you like to wear?’

  ‘You know, Levis, sweats, all that. Neat leggings, like yours.’

  They passed the lions again and came into the hall. ‘You’ll be old enough soon to pick your own clothes.’

  ‘Oh, yeah,’ Linda said, as if Harriet had told her she would soon be old enough to make an excursion to the moon. From her own childhood Harriet remembered the enticing, unattainable prospect of adult freedom.

  ‘You don’t believe it now, but you will.’

  They were in the drawing room again. After the chill outside it felt like a hothouse, and it was as overpoweringly scented. More guests had arrived and the big group had fractured into smaller ones; the noise level had risen perceptibly.

  Linda frowned. ‘Thanks,’ she mumbled, without looking at Harriet. ‘See you.’ Staring straight ahead of her she marched across the room and reinstalled herself in her armchair. She drew her legs up once more, and this time her muddy shoes were defiantly in contact with Annunziata’s chair cover. Harriet looked away, suppressing a smile. She was very conscious that her own feet were wet, and that her cheeks were red and glowing from the fresh air.

  Robin materialised at her elbow.

  ‘There you are. Come and meet Tom Sachs. He runs TKS, and he might be useful to you.’

  Harriet let him lead her over to one of the silver-haired men. Tom Sachs shook her hand and wished her Happy New Year, and they began to talk about Peacocks and media buying, with particular reference to Tom Sachs’ company.

  Harriet accepted another glass of champagne from the butler, and a canapé from a salver offered by an impassive-faced woman who was probably the housekeeper. She ate the tiny morsel whole, listening to Tom Sachs with as much attention as she could muster.

  ‘Your TV
commitment, of course, must be related directly to existing market awareness …’

  Harriet realised that someone new had entered the room behind her.

  Tom’s eyes flicked to the door and then dragged themselves back to Harriet. There was the smallest lull in the general conversation but it rose again immediately, louder than before, as if to confirm that there had been no break.

  Harriet resisted the urge to turn and look.

  A moment later Martin Landwith crossed into her line of sight. He was as handsome and suave as always, but next to his companion he seemed smaller, and lustreless.

  Harriet’s first thought was that she had known the man with him for years. She even made the beginning of a move to greet him. Then she realised with a sense of foolishness that of course she had never met him. Nor had she ever met anyone who held himself and moved in such a way, as if he was inevitably the centre of attention, the focus of all other eyes.

  It was a famous face, familiar from cinema and television screens.

  Annunziata swept towards him, the chilliness that Harriet had sensed entirely obliterated. ‘Caspar, you haven’t got a drink. Martin, you’ve neglected him.’ She almost clicked her fingers at the butler. Champagne materialised at once at the man’s elbow. As, Harriet reflected, most things he wanted probably did, and many more that he didn’t. He was Caspar Jensen. Harriet recalled the last of his films that she had seen. It was Thundercloud, not a very good movie and Caspar Jensen had played only a cameo role, but his face had appeared on all the posters. He had given a spate of interviews, there had been Jensen features in most of the glossies and colour supplements.

  Harriet felt, probably in common with most of the other people in the room, that she knew his life history from humble origins in Durham through Oxford and the stage, two failed marriages, to stardom in a series of highly successful films and then, latterly, less successful films. Harriet couldn’t recall when she had last heard of him making a stage appearance, although it was as a classical actor that he had first made his name. There had been rumours of other problems, implicitly denied in the upbeat publicity interviews.