Dance While You Can

by Susan Lewis

  And then there was only one more day, one more night, before fantasy must give way to reality. Elizabeth didn’t want to go to Venus Pool again, she said the pain of leaving it would be too great to bear.

  Dixcart Bay was deserted, and we sat down on the pebbles to watch the yachts sail in over the skyline. Later other people wandered on to the beach, an old couple walking their dog, teenagers strolling hand in hand, boys in a boat, rowing out of the bay and disappearing from sight. Neither of us spoke, we were both too aware of our looming departure. A man about my own age walked to the edge of the sea. His jeans were rolled up to the knees, and he tested the temperature with a bare foot, then turning, he waved to somebody behind us. A boy and a girl, neither of them older than six, sped towards him, and their mother followed, laughing as her husband gathered the children into his arms and swung them round. Tentatively, they ventured into the waves, the children shrieking at first, then gaining enough courage to plunge their bodies into the surf, and finally trying to splash their parents. For a long time the four of them played, oblivious to the rest of the world, and Elizabeth and I watched. Then the little boy fell. I felt my body stiffen and jerked myself up. But his father was there, ready to pick him up and comfort him. I relaxed and lay back again. It was several minutes before I realised that Elizabeth had turned her attention to me.

  ‘Alexander, what is it that’s making you so unhappy?’

  ‘You have to ask?’

  ‘No, there’s more. I’ve sensed it ever since we arrived here.’

  I started to get to my feet, but she pulled me back. ‘Alexander, please. Don’t shut me out. If there’s to be any future for us, you must tell me what’s troubling you.’

  I already knew the truth of what she was saying. Tears were gathering in her eyes and I felt my own stinging too. Then I looked round me again and knew that if we were to say good-bye anywhere, then it must be here. Here, where we had known love again.

  ‘Darling,’ I faltered. She said nothing, only took my hand and waited. For a time I was afraid to speak, afraid to tell her how I had cheated her by making promises I could never keep. And I was afraid to lose her – which I would in the end, no matter what she said, because my inability to have children, together with my jealousy of the child she already had by another man, would tear us apart. ‘Elizabeth.’ The family were moving away from the sea, chasing one another to the smugglers’ arch. Gently she turned my face back to hers, and waited for me to go on. ‘I should have told you the truth from the beginning, Elizabeth, but I was a coward. I wanted you so badly that I told myself it would be all right in the end. But it can’t be. We can’t be together, it’s just not possible.’

  I felt her fingers tense as I spoke, but couldn’t bring myself to look at her.

  ‘Is it because of Jessica?’ she said, after a while.

  I shook my head.

  ‘Because I’m married?’

  ‘No. Though God knows, that should be enough.’

  ‘Then what is it, Alexander? Tell me.’ There was desperation in her voice.

  I took her face between my hands and for an instant I saw Jessica’s mouth laughing back at me, ridiculing me. I let her go and leaned forward. ‘I’m infertile, Elizabeth. It’s why Jessica has never conceived. I am sterile, empty, useless, call it what you like, but I can’t give you any children. I know you’ll say it doesn’t matter, but it will. Living with you day after day, watching you and knowing that I . . .’

  ‘Alexander! Stop! Stop! How can you think that would ever make a difference? How little you must think of me to believe that I would be capable of turning away from you over something like that. Something that’s not even . . .’

  ‘Please, Elizabeth, don’t make this any harder. I know what you’re going to say next, that I will come to love your daughter as my own. Well, I can’t live with your daughter, Elizabeth, knowing she is the child of another man. I know I’m a coward, but I can’t do it.’

  ‘Alexander, look at me.’

  When I didn’t, she pulled me round to face her. ‘No, stop,’ she said, as I tried to speak. ‘Stop and listen to me. You’re not infertile, Alexander, do you hear me? You can’t be.’

  ‘There’s no point in denying it. Jessica . . . there were tests . . .’ I didn’t want to go on.

  She started to speak, then stopped. She tried again, then threw herself away from me and ran off across the beach.

  I let her go, as again I saw Jessica, heard her laughing even, but this time Elizabeth was there too. She had turned away from me, as I’d known she would. But God, how I had prayed she wouldn’t.

  She was sitting beside a rock not far away, her head buried in her hands. She looked up as my shadow fell over her. I was surprised to see that she wasn’t crying, though her face looked ravaged. I sat down beside her and held out my hand for hers. She took it.

  Staring straight ahead I started to speak. I told her then about Jessica, about the bitter fights we had, and the cruel way I had tormented her during the first years of our marriage. And I told her how, when Jessica found I was infertile, she had taken her revenge in the scorn and contempt she threw at me, knowing that I wanted a child more than anything else.

  When I had finished I raised her hand to my mouth and kissed it softly. ‘So, my darling, you can see now what my infertility has done to me and Jessica. I couldn’t bear that to happen to us.’

  I turned to look at her and saw that tears were streaming silently down her face. ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’ she whispered. ‘What have I done to you?’ She put her hand over my mouth as I started to speak. ‘There’s something you must know, Alexander. Something I should have told you a long time ago. I could have saved you all this pain. But I didn’t know what to do, please believe me, I was so young then, and so were you, and I didn’t know what to do for the best. I’m sorry, my darling . . .’

  ‘Elizabeth . . .?’

  ‘It’s Charlotte, Alexander, she’s . . . Charlotte is six years old.’

  At first I didn’t move. The sounds of everyday life continued, but all I could hear was the echo of Elizabeth’s words. I was too stunned to speak or to think, and feeling myself go weak, I leaned back against the rock and closed my eyes.

  How hurt she must have been to shield herself from me like that. And Jessica, how I must have hurt her too, for her to lie to me the way she had. I looked at Elizabeth and for a moment I didn’t understand her. All the times she could have told me in the past week, and hadn’t. I had a daughter. I closed my eyes again as tears slid unchecked over my face. I felt her arms go round me, cradling me like a child. But I couldn’t respond, my heart was numb. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, over and over. ‘I should have told you before. I’m sorry, my darling.’

  It was a long time later, when the tears had dried on my cheeks and the sun was sinking towards the horizon, that I was finally able to speak. ‘Tell me about her, Elizabeth. Tell me everything about her.’

  The following morning dawned dull and grey. It was the first miserable weather there had been, and Elizabeth sat at the window looking out at the rain.

  The night before we had been closer than I had ever dreamed possible. This morning we were quiet. In less than an hour Jack Serle would come with his horse and carriage to take us to the ferry. Already Elizabeth was wrapped up against the weather.

  The clock ticked monotonously in the corner. Elizabeth got up and said she was going for a walk. She wanted to go alone.

  I waited for her in the lounge, thinking about her and wondering what the future would bring. When it was almost time to leave I went to the window and looked out, but there was no sign of her. The door opened and Jack Serle came in. He was early, and went off to the kitchen for a cup of tea.

  I started to pace the room, looking at my watch. Where was she? Had something happened to her? The wind was vicious this morning, and the sea. Had she slipped and . . .?

  I went outside. The rain was heavier now, and the sound of the wind, raging through
the trees that cloistered the hotel, seemed sinister. I listened, straining my ears, as if expecting to hear her.

  And then suddenly I knew where she was, and I knew that I must go to her. Circling the hotel, I strode quickly through the garden behind, oblivious of the driving rain, only knowing that I had to get to her. Then I was running, through the orchard, over the stile, past Jespillière House and across the meadow. There was the barely hidden gap in the yellow gorse. I pushed through and out on to the cliff edge.

  She was a small figure huddled into the stone seat, her hair plastered to her face; alone in her grief. I held her close.

  ‘We will come back, Alexander, won’t we? Promise me that one day we will come back.’

  ‘I promise you, my darling. With all my heart, I promise you.’

  How could either of us have known then what was to come?

  – Elizabeth –

  – 20 –

  I was trying very hard not to look at my watch. Every muscle in my body was tensed to the point of breaking, and my heart thumped more rapidly as each minute passed. One o’clock on Friday at Jules’ Bar, he had said.

  I looked around at the lunch-time drinkers. A party in the corner that had sung ‘Happy Birthday’ a moment ago; a group of men standing at the bar, talking too loudly; office girls, businessmen. I turned back to my drink. He’s not going to come, I know he’s not going to come. The words beat a tattoo on my brain.

  A shadow fell over me, and the moment I saw Henry’s face I felt the blood drain from my own.

  ‘Elizabeth.’

  I tried to smile, but my heart was in my throat and I dug my fingers deep into the palms of my hands in an effort to keep calm.

  He sat down. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Oh, I’m fine. How are you?’

  ‘Yes, I’m fine.’

  I rushed on. ‘Alexander told me all about Caroline. I’m very happy for you, Henry. When’s it to be?’ I gave him a big smile, as if by doing so I could stop him from delivering the news that was written in every line of his face.

  ‘Next week, actually.’

  Neither of us said anything after that, as the waitress took our order then came back with the drinks.

  ‘He’s not coming, is he?’ I whispered.

  He looked down at his hands, bunched together on the table in front of him. Slowly, he shook his head.

  The denial rushed at me with such force that it snatched my breath. It couldn’t be true. This wasn’t happening. Any minute now I would wake up and Alexander would be walking through the door. All I had to do was open my eyes.

  When I did, Henry was still sitting beside me and I wanted to die. ‘Is it Jessica? Is he going back to her?’

  ‘He has to, Elizabeth.’

  I didn’t want to hear the compassion in his voice, I only wanted this to stop.

  ‘There was an accident. While you were away. Lady Bel, Alexander’s mother, was killed.’ I closed my eyes. ‘Jessica was driving. She’s in hospital. The doctors say she’ll be all right, but it’ll be some time.’ He waited a moment, then went on. ‘There’s something else, Elizabeth.’ I looked up. ‘After the accident, Jessica had a miscarriage.’

  Again I closed my eyes. The bitter irony, after all the lies she had told him, was too much to bear.

  ‘Did you know Alexander thought he was . . . ?’

  I nodded. ‘Why did she lie to him like that?’

  He didn’t answer and I could feel the pain dragging me down, swirling through me in relentless waves.

  ‘He told me about Charlotte.’

  ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘With his father.’

  ‘She’s very like him, you know, Henry. She’s got his curly black hair, it even falls over her face the way his does. And her eyes. They’re grey, but she has tiny specks of blue in them. She knows how to use them, of course, just like he does. You know, she even laughs like . . . Henry, I don’t know if I can bear this.’

  He reached out for my hand. ‘Come along, let’s get you out of here.’

  He took me back to his flat in Eaton Square where we talked until it was dark outside. I had stopped crying by then, but I knew that in the months that stretched emptily and endlessly ahead there would be many more tears. I had lost him once, and survived, but I didn’t know if I could do it again. I didn’t know if I even wanted to.

  Henry handed me my coat and tried again to persuade me to let him drive me home. I shook my head. I needed some time alone before I could face Charlotte.

  ‘He wants to see you, when all this is over. He’s asked me to find out where you live.’

  I looked into Henry’s face, and felt the years slip away. It was as if we were all back at Foxton’s and Henry had come to tell me that Alexander wanted me to be in their play. I shook my head. ‘No, Henry. It’ll only mean more pain for those who love us.’ For the first time I was thinking about Edward.

  ‘What about Charlotte?’

  ‘One day I will tell her about him. She’ll come to find him, I know she will. Just ask him to be patient.’

  He walked with me to the door. ‘Henry, please tell him . . .’ I stopped and looked into his face. His eyes were clouded and I guessed, in his own way, he was suffering too. ‘Nothing, it doesn’t matter, he’ll know anyway.’

  I can’t describe the way I felt in the weeks that followed, I only knew that the pain was more intense, more agonising than I had known anything could be. I thought about him day and night, reliving every moment we’d spent together, and asked myself a thousand times why God was punishing us like this. But even as I asked the question, I still refused to believe that this was the end.

  It was this denial of the truth that proved my downfall.

  As I carried out the daily tasks that were expected of me, the certainty that Alexander and I would be reunited grew in my mind until everything I did was in preparation for his coming. I stocked the library with law books and had the Renaissance paintings in the long gallery replaced with Impressionists – Christine scoured the auction rooms, armed with lists of what to look out for. Westmoor was suddenly buzzing with builders, decorators, gardeners. I bullied them along, they must be finished by the time Alexander came . . . .

  ‘But it’s got to be done,’ I said, when Edward told me I was going to wear myself out if I didn’t slow down.

  He smiled. ‘I’m going to Florence at the weekend. How about taking a break and coming with me?’

  I looked at him, aghast. Couldn’t he see I was far too busy to go to Florence, why didn’t he take Charlotte instead?

  But Charlotte didn’t want to go, either. At least, she did want to go, it was just that she didn’t want to leave me behind.

  ‘Leave me behind?’ I laughed. ‘If nothing else, it’ll be good to have you out from under my feet. Why aren’t you playing with your friends?’

  She looked up at me with her big eyes and I felt a surge of impatience. ‘Honestly, Charlotte, I just don’t know what . . .’

  ‘Why are you always getting at me? What have I done?’

  ‘Done? You haven’t done anything. Oh Charlotte, you’re impossible. Why don’t you take the horses out over the downs, they could do with the exercise, and so could you.’

  ‘We took them this morning.’

  ‘Did you?’ I laughed. ‘I don’t know, there seems to be so much on my mind lately. . . .’

  ‘Can we do something together, Mum? Just me and you? You know, like we used to.’

  ‘Can’t you see I’m busy, Charlotte? He’ll be here soon and I . . .’

  ‘Who’ll be here soon? You keep saying that.’

  I stared at her.

  ‘Who, Mum? Who’s coming?’

  ‘Why don’t you run along and find Edward if you’re going to Florence?’

  I found her later, sitting on her bed combing her doll’s hair. She looked as if she’d been crying and turned away when she saw it was me. I had to swallow my irritation. ‘How would you like to come up to London with me at
the weekend? We’ll go to the theatre.’ Alexander lived in Belgrave Square. I’d go there, tell him everything would be ready soon.

  ‘But what about Edward? He wants us to go to Florence.’

  ‘We won’t tell him. We’ll wait until he’s gone, then sneak off to London without telling anyone. Well, I suppose we’d better tell Canary. In fact, why don’t we take her with us? Run along and ask her, darling, I’ve got a lot to finish off here, and the designer will be coming back again this evening.’

  We saw an unmemorable matinée at the Savoy, drove out to Hampton Court, tore round the zoo and went to hamburger bars and cinemas. I didn’t go to Belgrave Square, it wasn’t time yet. But I’d go soon.

  When we got back to Westmoor Edward was still away, and the delivery men were waiting to install the apparatus in the gym. I supervised them as they unpacked, making sure everything I had ordered for Alexander was there. At four o’clock I dragged Charlotte along to visit Miss Barsby who lived in a cottage just outside the estate. Charlotte loathed the old woman and did very little to hide it. I watched with mounting annoyance as she delivered her monosyllabic replies to Miss. Barsby’s questions. I stood it for half an hour then, making my apologies to Miss Barsby, I took Charlotte by the hand and led her out to the car.

  ‘You’re a nasty, spoiled little girl,’ I said, once Miss Barsby had gone back inside. ‘She’s a lonely old lady who looks forward to your visits, and all you can do is sulk. Next week you’ll spend the whole afternoon with her, and talk to her properly. Do you hear me?’

  Charlotte sustained a mutinous silence until we pulled up outside the house. I leaned across and threw open her door. ‘Go to your room. I’ll deal with you later.’

  ‘You’re always picking on me these days. I wish I’d gone to Florence with Edward, he’s much nicer than you. You’re horrible.’